Tafsir of Qaf 50:16

"And We know what his soul whispers to him"

• Whispering (waswasa): The hidden sound. From this comes the waswas (clinking) of jewelry.
• Whispering of the soul: That which crosses a person’s mind and occurs in their conscience as internal discourse.
• The ba (in bihi): It is like your saying, "He made a sound with such-and-such" or "He whispered with it."
• Alternative interpretation: It may be for transitivity (ta‘diya), with the pronoun referring to the human, meaning: "what you cause to be whispered."
• The ma: It is a verbal noun (masdariyya), for they say, "He spoke to his soul with such-and-such," just as they say, "His soul spoke to him with it." The poet said:

  And belie the soul when it speaks to you.

"And We are closer to him than [his] jugular vein"

• "We are closer to him": This is a metaphor (majaz). The intended meaning is the proximity of His knowledge to him. It means that His knowledge relates to what is known of him and his states in such a way that nothing of his hidden matters is concealed from Him. Thus, it is as if His Essence is near him, just as it is said, "God is in every place," while He is exalted above places.
• "The jugular vein (habl al-warid): This is a proverb for extreme proximity, like their saying, "He is to me as the midwife’s seat" or "the knot of the loincloth." Dhu al-Rumma said:

  And death is closer to me than the jugular vein.

• The habl (rope/vein): It is the vein, likened to one of the ropes. Do you not see his saying:

  As if his two jugulars were two ropes of twisted fiber.

• The two waridan (jugulars): Two veins flanking the sides of the neck at its front, connected to the aorta (al-watin), descending from the head toward it. It is said it was named warid (from wird, to arrive) because the soul arrives at it.
• If you ask: What is the aspect of attributing the habl (rope) to the warid (vein), when a thing is not attributed to itself?
• I say: There are two aspects:
  1. The attribution is for clarification (bayan), like their saying "a camel of the saniya (water-drawing camel)."
  2. It intends the "rope of the shoulder," so it is attributed to the jugular vein, just as it is attributed to the shoulder, because they meet in one limb (as if one were to say, "the rope of the high-ground," for example).

"When the two receivers receive, seated on the right and on the left. He does not utter any word except that there is an observer present with him."