16
The lowest land
فِي أَدْنَى الْأَرْضِ
30:2
غُلِبَتِ الرُّومُ فِي أَدْنَى الْأَرْضِ وَهُم مِّن بَعْدِ غَلَبِهِمْ سَيَغْلِبُونَ
The Romans have been defeated in the nearest (or lowest) land, but they, after their defeat, will overcome.
The ayah in tafsir
Adna al-ard: the nearest land — nearest to Arabia, the Levant and the basin of the Dead Sea, where Heraclius’s wars with Persia were felt. Adna from dunuw (near) is the first reading. Adna from dunuw/danaah as low is a later lexical possibility some have pressed. The prophecy of the Romans’ return is the point of the passage; it happened as named.
What later eyes saw
The basin of the Dead Sea is the lowest exposed land on earth, hundreds of metres below the sea’s level. If adna is read as lowest, the battlefield sits on that floor. If it is nearest, it is still that frontier. Both can be true of one place. The prophecy does not depend on the altimeter. The altimeter, later, made one reading startling.
Where we stop
Keep the prophecy first. Do not pretend every mufassir said “below sea level.” The Arabic of adna is first of all nearness.