Surat Al-Kahf Verse No. 9: Reading and listening
Translation of the verse 9 from Surah Al-Kahf : Number of verses 110 - - page 294 - Part 15.
﴾أَمۡ حَسِبۡتَ أَنَّ أَصۡحَٰبَ ٱلۡكَهۡفِ وَٱلرَّقِيمِ كَانُواْ مِنۡ ءَايَٰتِنَا عَجَبًا ﴿
[ الكهف: 9]
Do you think that the people of the Cave and the Inscription (the news or the names of the people of the Cave) were a wonder among Our Signs?
English - Sahih International
Or have you thought that the companions of the cave and the inscription were, among Our signs, a wonder?
Tafheem-ul-Quran by Syed Abu-al-A'la Maududi
(18:9) Do you consider "the Sleepers of the Cave", *6 and the bearers of the "Inscription" *7 to be among Our strange Signs? *8
Tafheem-ul-Quran by Syed Abu-al-A'la Maududi
*6) The Arabic word (Kahaf) literally means a vast cave.
*7) There is a difference of opinion about the meaning of ar-raqim. Some Companions and their followers opined that it was the name of that habitation where this event took place and that it was situated somewhere between Aylah and Palestine. There are other commentators who take it to mean the "Inscription" that had been set up at the Cave as a memorial to "the Sleepers of the Cave". Maulana Abul Kalam Azad, in his commentary, Tarjmanul-Qur'an, has preferred the first meaning and opined that it is the same place which has been called Rekem in the Bible (Joshua, 18: 27). Then he identifies it with the ancient historical city of Petra. But he has not considered the fact that Rekem, as mentioned in the Bible, belonged to the children of Benjamin and according to the Book of Joshua, the territory of this clan was situated to the west of river Jordan and the Dead Sea and that the ruins of Petra are situated to the south of Jordan. That is why the modern archaeologists do not believe that Petra and Rekem are one and the same place. (Please refer to Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1946, Vol XVII, page 658). We are also of the opinion that by "Ar-raqim"is meant "the inscription".
*8) This question has been posed to expose the sceptical attitude of the disbelievers towards the "Sleepers of the Cave", as if to say, `Do you think that AIIah, Who has created the heavens and the earth, does not have the power to keep a few persons in a state of sleep for a couple of hundred years and then to raise them up as hale and hearty as they were at the time of going to sleep? If you ever had pondered over the wonderful creation of the sun and the moon and the earth, you would never have expressed any doubt that such a thing was anything difficult for Allah. "