Are thunderbolt and lightning Jibril’s whip?

- Are thunderbolt and lightning Jibril’s whip?

- Is there any relation between nature events like thunderbolt and lightning and the whip of Jibril?

Dear Brother / Sister,

- According to a narration from Ibn Abbas, the Prophet (pbuh) stated the following upon the question of the Jews:

“Ra’d (thunder) is an angel among the angels, who is responsible for the clouds. He has a piece of fire with which he drives the clouds wherever Allah wills. The noise we hear is the angel’s striking the clouds when he drives them on until they go where they are ordered.” (Musnad, 5/385-Shamila-; Tirmidhi, Tafsiru Suratir-Ra’d -the hadith is hasan, gharib-).

The word ra’d is used for both lightning and thunder as well as cloud.

- The expressions used in the hadith above do not contradict the issues determined by today’s scientists. It is known that the laws accepted to exist in the universe are relative and that they do not have external bodies that can be touched. Doubtlessly, the beings that are accepted to be based on those relative laws, which are a reflection of Allah’s power, need to be arranged and operated by conscious beings - having external bodies - called angels. It is a necessary result of divine wisdom. In addition, electricity, lightning, thunder and cloud composition could be explained to the people of fifteen centuries ago only to that extent.

- The following statement of Ali (ra) regarding the issue is the same as today’s scientific knowledge:

“The strongest creatures of Allah are mountains. Iron carves mountains. Fire eats/melts iron. Water puts out fire. The cloud between the sky and the earth carries water. The wind carries the cloud. Man tries to protect himself from the wind with his hand. Dizziness defeats man. Sleep defeats dizziness. Anxiety prevents sleep. So, the strongest creature of Allah is anxiety.”

This information reported by Tabarani is considered sound by Haythami. (see Majmauz-Zawaid, 8/132)

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