S13
Sleep as a sign, and souls "taken" in sleep
39:42 says God "takes the souls" in death and also in sleep, and "releases the others for a specified term": every night is a small rehearsal of death and return.
وَمِنْ ءَايَٰتِهِۦ مَنَامُكُم بِٱلَّيْلِ وَٱلنَّهَارِ وَٱبْتِغَآؤُكُم مِّن فَضْلِهِۦٓ ۚ إِنَّ فِى ذَٰلِكَ لَـَٔايَٰتٍ لِّقَوْمٍ يَسْمَعُونَ٢٣
Transliteration: wamin āyātihi manāmukum bi-al-layli wal-nahāri wa-ib'tighāukum min faḍlihi inna fī dhālika laāyātin liqawmin yasmaʿūna
And of His signs is your sleep by night and day and your seeking of His bounty. Indeed in that are signs for a people who listen.
وَجَعَلْنَا نَوْمَكُمْ سُبَاتًا٩
Transliteration: wajaʿalnā nawmakum subātan
And made your sleep [a means for] rest
ٱللَّهُ يَتَوَفَّى ٱلْأَنفُسَ حِينَ مَوْتِهَا وَٱلَّتِى لَمْ تَمُتْ فِى مَنَامِهَا ۖ فَيُمْسِكُ ٱلَّتِى قَضَىٰ عَلَيْهَا ٱلْمَوْتَ وَيُرْسِلُ ٱلْأُخْرَىٰٓ إِلَىٰٓ أَجَلٍ مُّسَمًّى ۚ إِنَّ فِى ذَٰلِكَ لَـَٔايَٰتٍ لِّقَوْمٍ يَتَفَكَّرُونَ٤٢
Transliteration: al-lahu yatawaffā l-anfusa ḥīna mawtihā wa-allatī lam tamut fī manāmihā fayum'siku allatī qaḍā ʿalayhā l-mawta wayur'silu l-ukh'rā ilā ajalin musamman inna fī dhālika laāyātin liqawmin yatafakkarūna
Allah takes the souls at the time of their death, and those that do not die [He takes] during their sleep. Then He keeps those for which He has decreed death and releases the others for a specified term. Indeed in that are signs for a people who give thought.
Translation: Saheeh International
"And of His signs is your sleep by night and day and your seeking of His bounty. Indeed in that are signs for a people who listen" (30:23), Meccan.
"And made your sleep [a means for] rest" (78:9), Meccan. Subāt comes from a root meaning to cut off or to pause.
Key word
Yatawaffā ("takes"): to take in full; the same verb is used of death.
See also: 6:60
Classical tafsir
Ibn Kathir on 39:42. God causes people to "die a lesser death" when they sleep, as against the "greater death" when the angels take souls from bodies. He links it to 6:60–61: "Here Allah mentions the two deaths, the lesser death then the greater death after it."
The bedtime prayer. Ibn Kathir cites, from al-Bukhari and Muslim through Abu Hurayra (ra), the supplication: "if You take my soul, have mercy on it, and if You send it back, protect it." On sunnah.com, Bukhārī 6320 Ṣaḥīḥ (sound) (Abu Hurayra) gives the Prophet's (pbuh) instruction to shake out one's bed, "for he does not know what has come on to it after him", and the Arabic: "Bismika Rabbi Wada`tu Janbi wa bika arfa'uhu, In amsakta nafsi farhamha wa in arsaltaha fahfazha bima tahfazu bihi ibadakas-salihin." In Bukhārī 6312 Ṣaḥīḥ (sound) (Hudhayfa), the bedtime words are "Bismika amutu wa ahya" (literally, "In Your name I die and live"), and on waking, "Al-hamdu li l-lahil-ladhi ahyana ba'da ma amatana wa ilaihin-nushur" — praise to God who gave us life after causing us to die, and to Him is the rising.
Al-Jalālayn on 39:42. God takes those who have not died "in their sleep in other words He takes them during sleep."
What they share. Sleep is a "taking" of the soul and a return; each morning's waking is a small resurrection. Neither commentary describes what the brain does in sleep.
How it works
Each point is tied to the verse's words "rest" (78:9) and "sign" (30:23).
- The brain cleans itself during sleep — in mice. [Moderate: animal evidence] In a study led by Maiken Nedergaard (University of Rochester), published in Science in 2013, "the space inside the brains increased by 60 percent when the mice were asleep or anesthetized"; dye injected into the cerebrospinal fluid flowed quickly through the brains of unconscious mice but barely moved when they were awake; and labelled beta-amyloid (a protein linked to Alzheimer's disease) "disappeared faster in mice brains when the mice were asleep" (NIH/NINDS release on Xie et al. 2013). The fluid system involved is called the glymphatic system.
- What this does and does not show. Every experiment in the 2013 study was done in mice. How large this effect is in humans was not addressed in the source read.
Points of awe
Every night a person gives up control, awareness and self-defence, and most mornings all of it is given back.
Reflection
Sleep is a daily, unchosen surrender. However strong or busy we are, each night we lie down, let go of control, and become unaware of everything — even of ourselves. And most mornings it is all given back.
The Quran calls this a "taking": "Allah takes the souls at the time of their death, and those that do not die [He takes] during their sleep" (39:42). Ibn Kathir calls sleep "a lesser death". The Prophet (pbuh) taught words for both ends of the night: before sleep, "Bismika amutu wa ahya" (In Your name I die and live); on waking, praise to the One who gave us life after causing us to die (this page's translation of the Arabic).
That makes every bedtime a small act of trust, and every morning a small resurrection. It also makes waking a gift, not a right: "He keeps those for which He has decreed death and releases the others for a specified term."
Today we know that sleep is busy work for the body — in mice, the brain even makes room to rinse itself. That does not replace the verse's sign; it adds to it. We do not run our own rest. We are put to sleep, and we are woken. The verse ends: "Indeed in that are signs for a people who give thought."
Questions readers ask next
What does "the lesser death" mean?
Ibn Kathir's term for sleep: the soul is "taken" and then released, as against the "greater death" in which it is kept.
What did the Prophet (pbuh) say before sleeping?
"Bismika amutu wa ahya" — "In Your name I die and live" (Bukhārī 6312 Ṣaḥīḥ (sound)); and, after shaking out his bed, a prayer asking mercy for the soul if God keeps it and protection if He sends it back (Bukhārī 6320 Ṣaḥīḥ (sound)).
Does sleep clean the brain?
In mice, sleep widened the spaces between brain cells by about 60% and sped up waste clearance (Xie et al. 2013). How much this happens in humans is still being studied.
Is sleep in Islam a kind of death?
The Quran uses the same verb, "take", for both. Ibn Kathir calls sleep a lesser death; it is not death, since the soul is released.
Sources
- Saheeh International — 30:23, 78:9, 39:42.
- Ibn Kathir, Tafsir (abridged English), and Tafsīr al-Jalālayn (English), on 39:42, https://surahquran.com/tafsir-english-aya-42-sora-39.html.
- Sahih al-Bukhari 6320 (sunnah.com), https://sunnah.com/bukhari:6320; Sahih al-Bukhari 6312, https://sunnah.com/bukhari:6312.
- NIH/NINDS news release (via ScienceDaily, 18 October 2013) on Xie, Kang, Xu et al., "Sleep Drives Metabolite Clearance from the Adult Brain", Science 342(6156):373 (2013), https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/10/131017144636.htm.
- Xie et al., "Sleep Drives Metabolite Clearance from the Adult Brain," Science 2013 (PDF)
- NIH news release, 2013
- Frontiers in Neurology commentary on Xie et al.
- Ibn Kathīr and al-Qurṭubī on 39:42; Bukhārī 6312