Surah 88. Al-Ghashiyah, Ayah 7

According to Al-Qiffal (as quoted by Razi), this kind of hellish drink and food is a metonym for utter hopelessness and abasement. As regards the noun dari' - which is said to be a bitter, thorny plant in its dried state (Jawhari) - it is to be borne in mind that it is derived from the verb dara'a or dari'a, which signifies "he [or "it"] became abject" or "abased", (ibid.): hence my rendering of this (obviously metaphorical) expression as "the bitterness of dry thorns". A similarly metaphorical meaning attaches to the expression "a boiling spring" in verse {5}, which recalls the term hamim so often mentioned in the Qur'an (see note [62] on the last sentence of 6:70 ).