Tafsir of An-Najm 53:44

According to this, it is metaphorical, and it is not hidden that the literal meaning also aligns with causing death and giving life, especially since death is often followed by weeping, and life at birth by laughter. How beautiful is the saying:

Your mother bore you, O son of Adam, weeping, While the people around you laughed in joy. So strive for yourself to be, When they weep on the day of your death, laughing and joyful.

Mujahid and al-Kalbi said: "[He] caused the people of Paradise to laugh and caused the people of the Fire to weep." It was also said: "[He] caused the earth to laugh with vegetation and caused the sky to weep with rain."

The placement of the pronoun [before the verb] and the repetition of the attribution are for the purpose of restriction (hasr); meaning that He, the Exalted, performed that, and no one else besides Him. Likewise, in [the phrase] "It is He who caused death and gave life," no one is capable of causing death or giving life except the Almighty and Majestic. The killer only destroys the human structure and separates its parts, while the death that results from that is the act of Allah, the Exalted, by way of habit in such instances. Thus, there is no contradiction in the restriction.