Selected Exegesis

After the angels realized their ignorance, inability, and unsuitability for the position of vicegerency, God the Exalted told Ādam to inform the angels about the names of the realities of the world, so that they would also realize Ādam’s knowledge and suitability.

The use of the term “informing” (inbāʾ) in relation to Ādam, whereas the term “teaching” (taʿlīm) was used previously, indicates that what the angels attained through Ādam’s informing is different from what Ādam acquired after God’s teaching. What was given to Ādam was knowledge and comprehension of the reality of things, while what the angels attained was merely news and a report about things.

The addition of “unseen” (ghayb) to “the heavens” is a genitive construction using “of” (lām), not “from” (min), which necessitates that this unseen (which is the names) is external to and absent from the heavens and earth, not of the same kind as them or a part of them (whether a part of their inner reality or a part of their outward form). The phrase “and I know what you reveal...” alludes to the relative unseen and alerts to the equality of what is manifest and hidden from the angels for God.

“What you reveal” refers to what the angels expressed in the phrase “Will You place upon it one who causes corruption therein...?” The phrase “what you concealed” refers to their hidden desire to remove the vicegerency from Ādam and grant it to themselves, or it refers to Iblīs’ arrogance in the incident of the command to prostrate, or it refers to some of the thoughts that occurred to them after the announcement of granting vicegerency, based on the idea of how it is possible for an earthly being to gain authority over everything, even over them. It is also possible to combine the three possibilities.