Before we start looking into the lessons found embedded in the Quran, we need to first understand what an “Aayah” is. What is an “Aayah?” (Very Loosely translated as ‘Verse’?)
We’ll have a brief philosophical look at the word from a linguistic perspective of what an ‘Aayah’ really is.
An “Aayah” is many things in linguistics, but one thing is that it points to something. Something that’s purposeful. Something that points to something more than itself.
Like for example, a street sign, a street sign is not your destination. A street sign is a means to an end. A street sign in of itself is very valuable, because without it you wouldn’t be able to get directions.
Like so, an “Aayah” is a means to guidance. Which makes sense because the Quran is guidance, and how do you get guidance? Through its Aayaat.
An Aayah points you to a reality. All of the Aayaat are pointing you to somewhere. Technically Allah is saying that if you look at the Earth with the right type of eyes. Spiritual eyes, not just the material eyes, it can lead you to ponder and reflect on your surroundings. You look at the trees outside your home, you see in Autumn/fall that the trees begin to shred leaves. Come winter, there are no more leaves at all. Then at Spring time, you begin to see those very same trees, growing back leaves. When Summer arrives, the trees look full and lush. This is just one example. The fact that Allah will bring back life to the dead. The Aayaat of Quran, together with the Aayaat (signs) of creation should lead you to navigate your minds appropriately. That’s the way of looking at reality.
Some people are blind to the Aayaat. The Quran in fact makes an interesting declaration about those who rejected revelation. Which basically says you people are oblivious to the Aayaat of creation. You’ve been denying all the Aayah’s around you throughout your whole life. So the fact that you denied the Aayaat of revelation in the Quran is not something new. You’ve been going along that road for quite some time.
Like Surah Rahman talks about the Aayaat of Quran which they’ve been denying, but then it mentions the physical realities which they’ve been denying; The earth, the oceans, the pearls, fields of grain, the sweet scents that comes from them, are Aayah’s they’ve already been rejecting.
So in summary, there are Aayah’s of the seen and the unseen, the physical reality and spiritual truths are pointing to the same thing. What that means is that we have a two dimensional view of reality that goes hand in hand. It’s all connected for us.
What the Quran does so beautifully is that it teaches us a lot of philosophical wisdom in the Quran through concrete and physical examples.