August 4, 2026 Türkçe
There is no shortage of people who try to find omissions or contradictions in the verses of the Qur'an. From time to time, they spot a detail and excitedly proclaim: "Look, these two verses describe the same event, yet one uses a singular form and the other a plural form! Here is an obvious contradiction!" In reality, behind that one-letter variation (hastily taken as a contradiction) lies an interesting logic, a shift in perspective, and a layer of meaning that is not immediately apparent. Classical tafsir works have discussed such nuances one by one for centuries and recorded them in detail.
Could the companions, the first recipients of the Qur'an, or the Arabic-speaking deniers who were constantly seeking opportunities to discredit the message, have failed to notice these differences? Of course they noticed them. If they did not raise any objections at that time, it means they understood the literary depth and layers of meaning behind those differences far better than we do.
Let me give an example from a well-known game: when an amateur —who thinks he knows chess pretty well— sits down with a true master, a similar situation occurs. The master appears to leave a pawn hanging carelessly, as if he had overlooked it. The amateur happily captures the pawn, thinking, "Aha, he missed it!" ... Yet two moves later he loses his rook, and a few moves after that, the game itself. The amateur's narrow horizon cannot grasp the depth of the master's vision extending many moves ahead.
Differences found in similar verses are often approached in the same superficial way. An outsider says, "Aha, I found a contradiction between these two verses! One pronoun is masculine, the other feminine!" and eagerly makes his move to capture that pawn. Yet the Great Master has concealed a depth of meaning within that difference. Some of the most striking examples of these wonderful nuances are found in the masculine (hû) and feminine (hâ) pronouns.
1. Species or Individual?
The word nusqîkum, meaning "We give you to drink," appears in two verses describing the milk we obtain from animals. In the phrase "from their bellies," one pronoun is masculine butûnihi, the other feminine butûnihâ:
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| https://okuyun.github.io/Kuran/#b=nsqykm |
In Surah an-Nahl, the matter is presented as a biological whole. Milk comes through the digestive system found within every female member of the animal species (masc). In Surah al-Mu'minun, however, the focus is directly on the body of the milk-producing animal (fem).
2. The Book or the Verse?
The word tazkirah, which appears in nine verses and means "reminder," is grammatically feminine. Yet it is actually used for the Qur'an. The pronouns referring to it are masculine innahû in two places, feminine hâdhihî ("this") in two places, and feminine innahâ in one place:
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| https://okuyun.github.io/Kuran/#b=ta*okirapN |
Let us look at a pair of verses that differ by only one letter:
Surah al-Muddaththir 74:54 — innahû (masc)
"No indeed! Surely, it is a reminder."
The pronoun refers not to tazkirah, but to the word Qur'an.
Surah 'Abasa 80:11 — innahâ (fem)
"No indeed! Surely, it is a reminder."
Here, the reference is not to the Qur'an itself, but to the Qur'anic verses.
This distinction can easily be seen in the verses that follow.
3. A Bird or a Model?
In Surah Al 'Imran, Jesus describes his own action from the human perspective and says, "I breathe into the bird" (masc fiyhi). In Surah al-Ma'idah, however, Allah corrects this expression according to the divine reality: "You did not breathe into a bird, but into the model you fashioned (fem fiyhâ); it is I who gave it life and made it a bird."
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| https://okuyun.github.io/Kuran/#b=Tyn%20kh (click the image to see the text more clearly) |
From Jesus' perspective, the object receiving the breath is the bird that is about to come to life (masc). In Surah al-Ma'idah, however, Allah changes the pronoun to the feminine form. For what Jesus breathed into was not yet a bird, but merely a clay model (fem). The One who gave it life and made it a bird was the divine will itself.
The tiny difference between a single "hû" and "hâ" perfectly reveals a shift in perspective, the depth of reality, and the logic behind the event through remarkable eloquence. Those who mistake a superficial textual difference for a contradiction and rush to celebrate their discovery become victims of their own shallow reading. While staring at seemingly unprotected pawns, they forget the Great Master who deliberately placed that pawn before them.
Note 1: In the three examples above, the masculine pronoun comes before the feminine one. But do not generalize too quickly; opposite examples also exist. (That may be another pawn)
Note 2: When I first found these examples in 2020, I was looking only at the aspect of textual preservation. Now I can clearly see that the dimension of meaning is even more fascinating.
