Dhū al-Qarnayn’s Possession of Every Kind of Means

God the Glorified gave Dhū al-Qarnayn every kind of means and every material and spiritual resource, so that he could reach whatever he wished: “and gave him a means to everything”; that is, He granted him whatever his rule over the whole earth required. For outward travel He gave him ordinary means, and for intellectual journeying He gave him knowledge; or He made learned companions his assistants. God may not give everything to one person; He gave knowledge to his friends, advisers and helpers, and he in turn could benefit sufficiently from each of them. So Dhū al-Qarnayn was not one-dimensional, such that, for example, he possessed material means in financial matters but in scholarly matters was unaware of the means of research; rather, he benefited, directly or through intermediaries, from all material resources such as bodily strength, financial power and abundant troops, and from spiritual resources such as intellect, knowledge, religion, wisdom and good management, and he made good use of all the material and spiritual means provided: “So he followed a means”.

In possessing means, Dhū al-Qarnayn is like Prophet Solomon (a.s.), with this difference: about Prophet Solomon (a.s.) God the Glorified does not speak of outward and ordinary means; rather, He says: We made the wind and the devils subservient to him: “So We subjected to him the wind, blowing gently by his command wherever he willed, and the devils, every builder and diver”;(75) and We gave him command over the wind, so that in the two halves of the day he travelled the distance of two months: “And to Solomon the wind – its morning course a month and its evening course a month”.(76) About Dhū al-Qarnayn, however, He says: We placed every kind of ordinary means at his disposal.