Mu'jam Kabir Tabarani 10549 — Abu Salih al-Harrani narrated to us

Ahmad bin Rishdin said: Abu Salih al-Harrani narrated to us in the year 223 AH; Hayyan bin Ubaydullah bin Zuhayr al-Misri Abu Zuhayr said, sixty years earlier: I asked al-Dahhak bin Muzahim about the saying of Allah Almighty: "No calamity befalls on the earth or in yourselves except that it is in a Book before We bring it into being; indeed, that is easy for Allah" [Surah al-Hadid: 22], and about His saying: "Indeed, We used to have recorded what you used to do" [Surah al-Jathiyah: 29], and about His saying: "Indeed, We have created everything in due measure" [Surah al-Qamar: 49]. He said: Sayyiduna Ibn Abbas (may Allah be pleased with them both) said: "Allah, the Mighty and Majestic, created the Throne and rose over it; then He created the Pen and commanded it to run by His command. He made the Pen as great as the space between the heaven and the earth. The Pen asked: O my Lord! What shall I write? He said: Write whatever I am going to create, whatever drop of rain, plant, soul or trace there is in My creation, meaning deeds, provision or appointed term. So the Pen wrote everything that is to be until the Day of Resurrection, and Allah established it in the Preserved Book (al-Lawh al-Mahfuz) with Him beneath the Throne. As for His saying: Indeed, We used to have recorded what you used to do [Surah al-Jathiyah: 29], Allah has appointed angels who, every year in Ramadan on the Night of Decree (Laylat al-Qadr), copy from that Book everything that is to occur on earth until the same night of the following year. These angels compare it every Thursday evening with Allah's guardians appointed over the servants, and they find what the guardians bring up in agreement with what is in that Book of theirs, with neither increase nor decrease in it. As for His saying: Indeed, We have created everything in due measure [Surah al-Qamar: 49], Allah created for everything what suits it of His creation and the provision that keeps it sound. He gave the camel a form such that no part of its form suits any other animal, and so it is with everything He created. He created for the animals and birds of the land the provision that keeps them sound on land, and He created for the animals and birds of the sea the provision that keeps them sound in the sea. That is what is meant by His saying: Indeed, We have created everything in due measure [Surah al-Qamar: 49]."