Meteorites Miracle in the Quran

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The Quranic verse 52:44 according to apologists, describes meteorites. But in reality it describes excuses of polytheists.

"Miracle"

1400 years ago people believed that objects fall intact. Nobody believed that a falling object can turn into ash. Today we know this is false.

A meteor moving through the vacuum of space typically travels at speeds reaching tens of thousands of miles per hour. When the meteor hits the atmosphere, the air in front of it compresses incredibly quickly. When a gas is compressed, its temperature rises. This causes the meteor to heat up so much that it glows. The air burns the meteor until there is nothing left.
How Stuff Works, Meteors burn up when they hit the Earth's atmosphere. Why doesn't the space shuttle?, 2019

When those meteorites enter our atmosphere the heat generated on entry burns them into ashes. This was only known recently, however this was portrayed in the Quran 1400 years before it was discovered.

[Quran 52:44] Even if they were to see lumps of the sky falling down, they would say, "A mass of clouds."

They would think that they are clouds because their ash looks like clouds.

How could an illiterate man who lived 1400 years ago have known that meteorites turn into cloud-like ash?


The verse

In order to understand the verse, we have to first read other verses.

This is how people challenged Shuayb (who claimed to be a prophet):

So cause to fall upon us fragments of the sky, if you should be of the truthful."


Shuayb succeeded in the challenge and the miracle happened:

And they denied him, so the punishment of the day of the black cloud seized them. Indeed, it was the punishment of a terrible day.


And in a similar way people challenged Muhammad (who also claimed to be a prophet):

Or you make the heaven fall upon us in fragments as you have claimed or you bring Allah and the angels before [us]


Muhammad failed in the challenge to present the miracle and his excuse was that if he did make the heaven fall upon them, they would supposedly make excuses:

And if they were to see a fragment from the sky falling, they would say, "[It is merely] clouds heaped up."


So the purpose of the verse is not to describe how meteorites looks like. It's in the context of Muhammad making excuses for not presenting miracles. And his excuse is that if he presented miracles, they would supposedly make excuses not to accept them. The point of the verse is that if the miracle happened it wouldn't look like a mass of clouds, but the polytheists would say "it's only a mass of clouds", because they are stubborn. And it's not specifically about meteorites, it's about "a piece of sky", which is much more vague.

See also