وَنَحنُ أَقرَبُ إِلَيهِ مِنكُم وَلٰكِن لا تُبصِرونَ

And We are nearer to him than you are, though you do not perceive.

EXEGESIS

We are nearer to him: the plural pronoun We apparently concerns God and His angels commissioned to seize the soul of the dying person. Another possibility is that it denotes God’s infinite power and absolute authority.

EXPOSITION

What distinguishes God’s nearness to His creatures (including all existents, whether living or inanimate) from any other nearness is that God is the all-sustainer (al-qayyūm, 2:255, 3:2, 20:111). He is the source of existence, and no existent is independent of Him. All beings are only reflections of that infinite light that has shined upon these delimited mirrors. So how can He ever be separate or absent from any existent? He is the first and the last, the manifest and the hidden, and He has knowledge of all things (57:3); We had not been absent (7:7).

When have You been away from my heart?

Have You ever been absent or apart?

So who should I find? For here You are!

And who should I seek? You are not far!^{‎[1]Furūghī Basṭāmī, ghazal 9.}

INSIGHTS FROM OTHER TRADITIONS

1. Behold, I go forward, but he is not there; and backward, but I cannot perceive him: On the left hand, where he doth work, but I cannot behold him: he hideth himself on the right hand, that I cannot see him.^{‎[2]Job 23:8-9.}
2. That they should seek the Lord, if haply they might feel after him, and find him, though he be not far from every one of us: For in him we live, and move, and have our being …^{‎[3]Acts 17:27-28.}

[1] Furūghī Basṭāmī, ghazal 9.
[2] Job 23:8-9.
[3] Acts 17:27-28.