وَجَعَلُوا المَلائِكَةَ الَّذينَ هُم عِبادُ الرَّحمٰنِ إِناثًا ۚ أَشَهِدوا خَلقَهُم ۚ سَتُكتَبُ شَهادَتُهُم وَيُسأَلونَ

And they have made the angels who are servants of the All-Beneficent females. Were they witness to their creation? Their testimony will be written down and they shall be questioned.

EXEGESIS

As with verse 15, jaʿalū connotes making a claim^[1] or issuing a verdict^[2] without providing any supporting evidence. It signifies an assertion based on personal belief rather than factual substantiation. In both instances, this term highlights the absence of proof for the statements made.[3]

The question, Were they witness to their creation? is a rhetorical one that is meant to show incredulity and negation.

The phrase Their testimony will be written down and they shall be questioned is a threat.

Satuktabu (will be written down) is in the future tense. Some exegetes suggest that this could intend future continuous, and thus the idea would be that whenever they make such a claim, their testimony will always be written down.[4] Alternatively, the letter sīn in satuktabu (will be written down) could be to indicate emphasis and not future tense.[5]

EXPOSITION

This verse mentions the belief of a group of polytheists who believed that at least some of the angels, including their deities, were female, and considered them to be the daughters of God (see also 16:57, 37:150, and 53:27).

The polytheists were of different groups and held different beliefs. Whilst some considered their deities to be the daughters of God, they did not consider all the angels to be daughters of God, even though this may be the apparent implication of the verse.[6] In fact, in all instances in the Quran where some angels are sent to earth in human form, they appear in the masculine gender, and there are no indications that the Meccan polytheists ever objected to this. And had We made him an angel, We would have surely made him a man, and We would have surely confounded them in regard to [the truth] that they confound (6:9).

Other instances mentioned in the Quran where angels apparently appeared in a masculine form include: Gabriel visiting Lady Mary in the form of a man (19:16-22); the angels manifesting as male guests for Prophet Abraham (a) and Prophet Lot (a) (11:69-78); angels visiting Prophet David (a) in the form of two male contenders to solve their dispute (38:21-25); the angels Hārūt and Mārūt during the time of Prophet Solomon (a) seem to have appeared in masculine form based on the usage of masculine pronouns when referring to them, as well as exegetical narrations that depict them as such (2:102). Furthermore, the Quran depicts the reaction of the women of Egypt upon glancing at Prophet Joseph (a) – marvelled by his beauty, they exclaimed, Good heavens! This is not a human being! This is but a noble angel! (12:31). These references reduce the possibility that the immediate audience of the Quran held the belief that all angels were female.[7]

Some exegetes[8] mention the tribes of Kinānah and Khuzāʿah, whilst others[9] add Juhaynah, Sulaym, and Banī Mulayḥ (which was a branch of Khuzāʿah) as the tribes that are known to have held the belief that all angels were females.

REVIEW OF TAFSĪR LITERATURE

It has been suggested that the angels being referred to in this verse are not all the angels, but specifically the three main idols that the polytheists would worship: al-Lāt, al-ʿUzzā, and Manāt. These three idols were considered, at one point in time, to be symbols of three female angels.[10]

TOPICAL ARTICLES

Origins of the Belief in Angels being Feminine

The origin of this belief is a matter of much discussion and different exegetes have suggested different reasons as to why angels came to be associated with the female gender. Some have suggested that perhaps this belief originated from the fact that angels are hidden to mankind, just as how women tended to stay hidden and away from the gaze of the public.[11] In line with this, perhaps the reason why the sun is considered feminine in terms of Arabic grammar is because the disc of the sun tends to remain hidden beneath its powerful rays, whilst the moon is considered masculine as its disc is apparent.[12] Similarly, some exegetes have opined that, generally speaking, the reason why some non-living things are considered feminine according to the rules of Arabic grammar is because those things have an element of hiddenness.[13]

Some have suggested that perhaps this belief originated in the fact that angels are similar to women in how subtle and tender they were considered to be.[14] Others have suggested that perhaps the polytheists considered angels to be females because they harboured some kind of enmity against them and thus attributed to them the gender that they despised.[15] Possible indications towards a latent enmity that some of the polytheists may have harboured against angels, in general, or Gabriel and Michael in particular, can be seen in several verses such as 2:97-98 which describes the attitude of the Jews: Say: ‘Whoever is an enemy of Gabriel [should know that] it is he who has brought it down on your heart with the will of Allah, confirming what has been [revealed] before it, and as a guidance and good news to the faithful.’ [Say]: ‘Whoever is an enemy of Allah, His angels and His apostles, and Gabriel and Michael, [let him know that] Allah is indeed the enemy of the faithless.’

Contemporary researchers have suggested that tribes such as Juhaynah and Khuzāʿah had ancestral roots in Yemen. It was only after the destruction of the Maʾrib dam (see 34:16) that they migrated towards the northern and central parts of Arabia. Based on the fact that most of the people in Yemen were Jewish, it is not farfetched to assume that perhaps the belief in the feminine nature of angels was something adopted from the Jews.[16] Interestingly, Christian Robin notes the presence of a pre-Islamic monument in Yemen with a representation of four female figures described as ‘daughters of [the god] ([b]hnt ʾ(l)’.[17] The famous Iraqi historian, Jawād Ali Kassār, concludes that the Arabs did not have much knowledge or detailed beliefs about angels. Their beliefs on this topic were primarily based on Judeo-Christian sources, and thus only those tribes that had some relation with the Jews and Christians tended to believe in angels being females.[18]

According to Qatādah, it was the Jews who held on to such a belief, which also included the idea that God married the jinn, and the angels were born as a result of such a relation.[19] Some exegetes have suggested that the polytheists of Mecca also had such a belief (see 37:158 and 6:100 for possible indications towards this belief),[20] perhaps due to the influence of the Jews, as suggested earlier.

This false belief has remained in the minds of people and traces of it can still be seen today. For example, art works tend to depict angels as feminine, such as the famous ‘angel of freedom’ that is depicted as a beautiful woman with long hair.[21]

Some exegetes opine that by describing the angels as servants of the All-Beneficent, this is an implicit rejection of the claim that angels are female, as the word ʿibād (servants) was never applied to females. However, this should not be understood as an implication that angels are thus males, for they are immaterial creatures and beyond such gender divisions that are specific to animals.[22] The word ‘servant’ is applicable to beings that are above gender, as is the pronoun ‘He’ when used to refer to Allah.[23]

The Quran describes them as beings that are the honourable servants of Allah who do not venture to speak ahead of Him, and act by His command (21:26-27).

Some have suggested that the phrase servants of the All-Beneficent as opposed to any other name or attribute of God, such as ‘servants of Allah’ or servants of the ‘All-Powerful’, is an indication that most of the angels are involved in executing the mercy of Allah and maintaining the affairs of the realm of existence, all of which is a manifestation of His mercy.[24] Furthermore, this title, servants of the All-Beneficent, is not specific to the angels but is more universal and can also include humans and jinn (see 25:63-76 for a description of the qualities of these servants).[25]

The verse then condemns them for their methodology in reaching such a conclusion. Knowing the gender of angels is dependent on visually observing their creation, and because the polytheists obviously were not witness to their creation (see 18:51), it was therefore not possible to have such knowledge (see also 37:150).

Abū Ḥayyān reports that the Prophet asked the polytheists how they came to know that the angels were females, to which they replied: ‘We heard that from our forefathers and we bear witness that they did not lie.’ The verse thus responded to this claim of theirs with Their testimony will be written down and they shall be questioned.[26]

The verse ends by threatening them that they shall be held accountable for such claims on the Day of Judgement. Many exegetes take this as a general warning against bearing witness to things of which one has no knowledge, which is something that man will be questioned about upon resurrection.

[1] Razi, 27/623.
[2] Tabrisi, 9/64.
[3] Maraghi, 25/77; Muhit, 9/365.
[4] Furqan, 26/290.
[5] Ibn Ashur, 25/231.
[6] Mizan, 18/90.
[7] Zahra Muhaqiqiyān, Farishtegān-e Muʾannath dar Qurʾān wa Kitāb-e Muqaddas: Chālishhā wa Masāʾil-e Murtabiṭ. DOI: 10.22067/JQURAN.2021.61755.0.
[8] Razi, 20/224; Alusi, 7/406; Qurtubi, 10/116.
[9] Mizan, 17/172; Amthal, 14/414.
[10] Zahra Muhaqiqiyān, Farishtegān-e Muʾannath dar Qurʾān wa Kitāb-e Muqaddas: Chālishhā wa Masāʾil-e Murtabiṭ. DOI: 10.22067/JQURAN.2021.61755.0.
[11] Amthal, 16/28; Razi, 20/224.
[12] Amthal, 16/28.
[13] Mudarrisi, 12/449.
[14] Amthal, 16/28.
[15] Mudarrisi, 12/449.
[16] Zahra Muhaqiqiyān, Farishtegān-e Muʾannath dar Qurʾān wa Kitāb-e Muqaddas: Chālishhā wa Masāʾil-e Murtabiṭ. DOI: 10.22067/JQURAN.2021.61755.0.
[17] Gabriel Said Reynolds, The Qur'an and the Bible: Text and Commentary, p. 734; see also Patricia Crone, “The religion of the Qurʾānic pagans: God and the lesser deities.” Arabica 57.2 (2010): 151-200.
[18] Jawād Ali Kassār, Tārīkh al-ʿArab Qabl al-Islām, 12/314.
[19] Suyuti, 6/15.
[20] Quoted by Amthal, 14/416, 4/408.
[21] Amthal, 16/28.
[22] Mizan, 18/90.
[23] Amthal, 16/28.
[24] Amthal, 16/28.
[25] Fadlallah, 20/223.
[26] Muhit, 9/365.