Animals and the earth: the ethics of trust in the Qur'an

In brief

The Qur'an places the human being on earth as a khalīfa. Yet the same text presents this office not as a title deed but as a responsibility that will be examined. Creatures that move on the earth and birds that fly with their wings are called "communities like you"; their provision is tied to God, not to human generosity. A balance is set in place along with the raising of the sky, and transgressing it is forbidden. Excess is prohibited. Destroying "crops and progeny" becomes the very definition of corruption. And when corruption appears on land and sea, the text names its source without hedging: what human hands have earned. This article follows that cluster of verses in the order the text itself uses, and marks where the verse stops speaking and interpretation begins.

Verses discussed

• 2:30 — The human being is appointed on earth; the angels raise the possibility of corruption.
• 6:165 — Succession is framed as a trial: being tested through what has been given.
• 35:39 — Succession is granted; the cost of ingratitude falls on the successor.
• 11:61 — The human being was produced from the earth and settled in it.
• 6:38 — Creatures on the earth and birds in flight are "communities like you".
• 24:41 — Birds with wings spread also exalt Him; each knows its own prayer.
• 11:6 — There is no creature on earth whose provision is not upon God.
• 29:60 — Many a creature carries no provision; He provides for it and for you.
• 16:5 — In livestock there is warmth and many benefits for people.
• 16:6 — There is beauty in them when brought in at evening and sent out at morning.
• 16:7 — They carry loads to places hard to reach otherwise.
• 16:8 — Horses, mules and donkeys: to ride, and as adornment.
• 55:7 — The sky was raised and the balance was set.
• 55:8 — Transgression within that balance is forbidden.
• 55:9 — Weight is to be established in justice; the balance not made deficient.
• 7:31 — Eat and drink, but be not excessive; He does not like the excessive.
• 6:141 — Give the due of the harvest, and still do not be excessive.
• 17:26 — Give what is due; do not spend wastefully.
• 17:27 — The wasteful are called brothers of the devils.
• 2:205 — Corruption defined: destroying crops and progeny.
• 30:41 — Corruption on land and sea is tied to what human hands earned.
• 7:56 — Corruption on an earth already set in order is forbidden.

Succession: authority, or a trust?

The human position on earth is summed up in one word: khalīfa. Where the word first appears the scene is an appointment — and what makes it remarkable is the objection that immediately follows.

إِنِّى جَاعِلٌ فِى ٱلْأَرْضِ خَلِيفَةً

"And [mention, O Muḥammad], when your Lord said to the angels, 'Indeed, I will make upon the earth a successive authority.'" (2:30)

The angels ask whether He will place there "one who causes corruption therein and sheds blood". The text therefore sets succession next to the possibility of corruption at the very moment it is established. The office is given with its risk already known.

The plural form carries the same frame. There the office is defined not as a privilege but as a test.

وَهُوَ ٱلَّذِى جَعَلَكُمْ خَلَـٰٓئِفَ ٱلْأَرْضِ وَرَفَعَ بَعْضَكُمْ فَوْقَ بَعْضٍ دَرَجَـٰتٍ لِّيَبْلُوَكُمْ فِى مَآ ءَاتَىٰكُمْ

"And it is He who has made you successors upon the earth and has raised some of you above others in degrees [of rank] that He may try you through what He has given you." (6:165)

The same phrase returns in Sūrat Fāṭir, this time specifying where the cost of ingratitude lands: "It is He who has made you successors upon the earth. And whoever disbelieves — upon him will be [the consequence of] his disbelief." (35:39). In Ṣāliḥ's address to Thamūd the human relation to the earth is stated along the line of origin and settlement.

هُوَ أَنشَأَكُم مِّنَ ٱلْأَرْضِ وَٱسْتَعْمَرَكُمْ فِيهَا

"He has produced you from the earth and settled you in it." (11:61)

(interpretation) Read together, these four verses do not describe a proprietary power meaning "the earth is yours, do as you wish". Three qualifications always arrive together: the office is granted (2:30), an account is required for what was given (6:165), and the bill for misusing it is charged to the officeholder (35:39). In legal terms this is not ownership but agency — the authority is real, yet borrowed, bounded and reviewable. The note in 11:61 that the human being was produced from the earth likewise refuses to place him outside it.

"Communities like you": the standing of animals

One of the most striking sentences in the text places animals inside the same categorical vocabulary as human beings.

وَمَا مِن دَآبَّةٍ فِى ٱلْأَرْضِ وَلَا طَـٰٓئِرٍ يَطِيرُ بِجَنَاحَيْهِ إِلَّآ أُمَمٌ أَمْثَالُكُم

"And there is no creature on [or within] the earth or bird that flies with its wings except [that they are] communities like you." (6:38)

The sentence does not end there: it continues, "Then unto their Lord they will be gathered." Animals are thus included not only in the language of creation but in the language of outcome.

In Sūrat al-Nūr birds become the subject of the vocabulary of worship.

وَٱلطَّيْرُ صَـٰٓفَّـٰتٍ ۖ كُلٌّ قَدْ عَلِمَ صَلَاتَهُۥ وَتَسْبِيحَهُۥ

"Do you not see that Allāh is exalted by whomever is within the heavens and the earth and [by] the birds with wings spread [in flight]? Each [of them] has known his [means of] prayer and exalting [Him]." (24:41)

On the question of provision, too, the animal is not presented as dependent on human giving but as tied directly to God.

وَمَا مِن دَآبَّةٍ فِى ٱلْأَرْضِ إِلَّا عَلَى ٱللَّهِ رِزْقُهَا

"And there is no creature on earth but that upon Allāh is its provision." (11:6)

وَكَأَيِّن مِّن دَآبَّةٍ لَّا تَحْمِلُ رِزْقَهَا ٱللَّهُ يَرْزُقُهَا وَإِيَّاكُمْ

"And how many a creature carries not its [own] provision. Allāh provides for it and for you." (29:60)

(interpretation) The combined effect is that an animal is not, in legal idiom, a "thing". In 6:38 it is named with the same word used for human collectives — umma. In 24:41 it is credited with a mode of worship of its own. In 11:6 and 29:60 its sustenance is attributed to God rather than to human charity. That last point is decisive for an ethics of trust: feeding an animal is not a donation but the handling of a provision that was never the handler's to begin with. The text does not say the animal is the human being's equal; it equally refuses the claim of absolute ownership over it.

Benefit is granted; ownership is not claimed

Sūrat al-Naḥl lists the benefits animals bring, one by one. That list is not the opposite of an ethics of trust; it is precisely its ground. Benefit is not denied — its source is recalled.

وَٱلْأَنْعَـٰمَ خَلَقَهَا ۗ لَكُمْ فِيهَا دِفْءٌ وَمَنَـٰفِعُ وَمِنْهَا تَأْكُلُونَ

"And the grazing livestock He has created for you; in them is warmth and [numerous] benefits, and from them you eat." (16:5)

وَلَكُمْ فِيهَا جَمَالٌ حِينَ تُرِيحُونَ وَحِينَ تَسْرَحُونَ

"And for you in them is [the enjoyment of] beauty when you bring them in [for the evening] and when you send them out [to pasture]." (16:6)

وَتَحْمِلُ أَثْقَالَكُمْ إِلَىٰ بَلَدٍ لَّمْ تَكُونُوا۟ بَـٰلِغِيهِ إِلَّا بِشِقِّ ٱلْأَنفُسِ

"And they carry your loads to a land you could not have reached except with difficulty to yourselves." (16:7)

وَٱلْخَيْلَ وَٱلْبِغَالَ وَٱلْحَمِيرَ لِتَرْكَبُوهَا وَزِينَةً ۚ وَيَخْلُقُ مَا لَا تَعْلَمُونَ

"And [He created] the horses, mules and donkeys for you to ride and [as] adornment. And He creates that which you do not know." (16:8)

(interpretation) What stands out is the ordering. Between warmth and food (16:5) and haulage (16:7), an item of sheer beauty is inserted (16:6): the herd's evening return and morning departure is named as an aesthetic good independent of use. 16:8 does it once more — the mount is both function and zīna, adornment. The animal is not positioned solely as an input to production. And the grammatical subject throughout is not the human being: "He created", "He creates". The benefit belongs to the human being; the animal does not.

The balance that must not be broken

Sūrat al-Raḥmān joins the raising of the sky and the setting of a balance in a single sentence, then immediately asks that the balance be left intact.

وَٱلسَّمَآءَ رَفَعَهَا وَوَضَعَ ٱلْمِيزَانَ

"And the heaven He raised and imposed the balance" (55:7)

أَلَّا تَطْغَوْا۟ فِى ٱلْمِيزَانِ

"That you not transgress within the balance." (55:8)

وَأَقِيمُوا۟ ٱلْوَزْنَ بِٱلْقِسْطِ وَلَا تُخْسِرُوا۟ ٱلْمِيزَانَ

"And establish weight in justice and do not make deficient the balance." (55:9)

(interpretation) The sequence performs a descent: from cosmic scale (the sky) to a moral imperative (do not transgress) to a measurable daily practice (do not give short weight). That descent is the text's own bridge. Reading mīzān as only a set of scales, or only justice, or only ecological equilibrium therefore takes one of three steps and drops the other two. What matters for an ethics of trust is that the same word can govern the order of the universe and the scales in a marketplace: breaking the measure is the same act at any scale.

Excess and squandering: the everyday breach

The Qur'an marks the limit of consumption with two words: isrāf (going beyond the bound) and tabdhīr (squandering). Neither appears as a free-floating sin; each arrives as a qualification attached to a permission.

وَكُلُوا۟ وَٱشْرَبُوا۟ وَلَا تُسْرِفُوٓا۟ ۚ إِنَّهُۥ لَا يُحِبُّ ٱلْمُسْرِفِينَ

"O children of Adam, take your adornment at every masjid, and eat and drink, but be not excessive. Indeed, He likes not those who commit excess." (7:31)

The same qualification recurs in the context of harvest — first the due is to be given, then excess is barred.

كُلُوا۟ مِن ثَمَرِهِۦٓ إِذَآ أَثْمَرَ وَءَاتُوا۟ حَقَّهُۥ يَوْمَ حَصَادِهِۦ ۖ وَلَا تُسْرِفُوٓا۟

"Eat of [each of] its fruit when it yields and give its due on the day of its harvest. And be not excessive." (6:141)

In Sūrat al-Isrā' squandering is described in unusually sharp terms.

وَلَا تُبَذِّرْ تَبْذِيرًا

"And give the relative his right, and [also] the poor and the traveler, and do not spend wastefully." (17:26)

إِنَّ ٱلْمُبَذِّرِينَ كَانُوٓا۟ إِخْوَٰنَ ٱلشَّيَـٰطِينِ

"Indeed, the wasteful are brothers of the devils." (17:27)

(interpretation) In all three the structure is identical: permission or command first, limit second. Eating is allowed; excess is not (7:31). Eating the harvest is allowed; withholding its due and losing the measure are not (6:141). Spending is required; squandering is not (17:26-27). This matters: the text does not forbid consumption and prescribe asceticism, it places a ceiling on consumption. And in 17:26 there is a floor right next to the ceiling — the right of the relative, the poor and the traveller. The limit does not only say "consume less"; it says where the remainder goes.

Crops, progeny, land and sea

When the Qur'an defines corruption (fasād) it does not stay abstract; it gives it two concrete objects.

وَإِذَا تَوَلَّىٰ سَعَىٰ فِى ٱلْأَرْضِ لِيُفْسِدَ فِيهَا وَيُهْلِكَ ٱلْحَرْثَ وَٱلنَّسْلَ ۗ وَٱللَّهُ لَا يُحِبُّ ٱلْفَسَادَ

"And when he goes away, he strives throughout the land to cause corruption therein and destroy crops and animals. And Allāh does not like corruption." (2:205)

Sūrat al-Rūm gives both the extent of the damage and its source.

ظَهَرَ ٱلْفَسَادُ فِى ٱلْبَرِّ وَٱلْبَحْرِ بِمَا كَسَبَتْ أَيْدِى ٱلنَّاسِ لِيُذِيقَهُم بَعْضَ ٱلَّذِى عَمِلُوا۟ لَعَلَّهُمْ يَرْجِعُونَ

"Corruption has appeared throughout the land and sea by [reason of] what the hands of people have earned so He may let them taste part of [the consequence of] what they have done that perhaps they will return [to righteousness]." (30:41)

In Sūrat al-A'rāf the prohibition is framed by reference to the earth's prior condition.

وَلَا تُفْسِدُوا۟ فِى ٱلْأَرْضِ بَعْدَ إِصْلَـٰحِهَا

"And cause not corruption upon the earth after its reformation." (7:56)

(interpretation) 2:205 gives corruption two targets: ḥarth (tillage, crop) and nasl (progeny, stock). Neither is a static object; both are capacities for renewal — one vegetal, one animal. On this reading fasād is less the consumption of what exists than the severing of what regenerates. 30:41 widens the same thought spatially: land and sea, the whole of the reachable world. And its agent clause is not indirect — "what the hands of people have earned". The qualification in 7:56, "after its reformation", frames damage as an intervention rather than a starting condition.

A note on roots and words

The counts below were taken from this platform's word-and-root table, in which the entire Qur'anic text is tagged word by word.

Two further counts:

• The singular khalīfa occurs in only two places: 2:30 and 38:26. The plural khalāʾif occurs in four (6:165, 10:14, 10:73, 35:39); khulafāʾ in three (7:69, 7:74, 27:62).
• The noun mīzān occurs in nine places: 6:152, 7:85, 11:84, 11:85, 42:17, 55:7, 55:8, 55:9, 57:25. Most are in the context of measure in trade; 55:7 is cosmic.

(interpretation) That the singular khalīfa appears only twice suggests the textual footing for the sweeping "lord of the earth" rhetoric built on it is narrower than commonly assumed. One of the two occurrences (38:26) addresses David and is immediately followed by "judge between the people in truth" — there too the office is qualified duty, not unqualified power.

Different readings

(interpretation) Cosmological reading. Takes the mīzān of 55:7-9 primarily as the physical order of the universe; "transgressing the balance" then names interference with natural equilibria, and commercial measure is the human-scale instance of the same principle. Its strength: 55:7 puts the balance in the same sentence as the sky. Its weakness: 55:9 speaks plainly of weighing.

(interpretation) Legal-commercial reading. Takes mīzān essentially as justice in weights and measures, resting on occurrences in trade contexts such as 6:152, 7:85, 11:84-85 and 17:35. On this reading the cosmic frame of 55:7 is an opening that magnifies the weight given to commercial honesty.

(interpretation) Ecological reading. Takes 30:41 as pointing to environmental degradation and reads "crops and progeny" in 2:205 as biological continuity. Its strength: 30:41 supplies both a spatial description (land and sea) and an agent (human hands). Its limit: the verse does not specify the kind of corruption; climate, pollution and species loss are matched to it from today's vocabulary, not from the wording.

(interpretation) Moral-theological reading. Takes the fasād of 30:41 as human transgression and its social consequences. Here the subject is not nature but the disorder people create, and the "tasting" is a corrective warning.

These four readings need not exclude one another. 6:38's naming of animals as communities and 11:6's assignment of provision to God constrain the human position in all four.

The honest limit

What the text states plainly: Creatures on the earth and birds flying with their wings are communities like human beings, and they will be gathered to their Lord (6:38). Birds exalt God and each knows its own prayer (24:41). Every creature's provision is upon God (11:6, 29:60). The benefits animals bring are enumerated, and their Creator is named (16:5-8). A balance was set with the raising of the sky; transgressing it and giving short weight are forbidden (55:7-9). Excess in eating and squandering in spending are prohibited (7:31, 6:141, 17:26-27). Destroying crops and progeny is called corruption (2:205); corruption on land and sea is tied to human earning (30:41); corruption on an earth already set in order is forbidden (7:56). The human being is appointed on earth within a framework of testing (2:30, 6:165, 35:39).

What is left to interpretation: The full scope of "communities like you" in 6:38 — whether animals bear moral responsibility, in what sense they are gathered — is not explained; the verse does not say, so any sentence built in that direction is interpretation. Whether the exalting in 24:41 is a conscious act or an existential order is not stated. Whether the mīzān of 55:7 is cosmic equilibrium, moral principle or a merchant's scales is not fixed to one sense; the three readings above arise from that opening. That the "corruption" of 30:41 means environmental damage is an inference drawn from present context rather than from the wording; the verse mentions neither climate nor species. No numerical threshold for excess is given anywhere. Concrete rules on animal welfare, slaughter conditions, experimentation or hunting limits cannot be derived directly from these verses; those were developed in the juridical layer and are not this article's subject.

What this article is not: It is not an environmental policy proposal, nor a list of the permitted and the forbidden. It does not claim the Qur'an anticipated modern ecology. It shows what the verses say in their own idiom and marks where they touch today's questions — no further.

Conclusion: What unites this cluster is that it frames human authority without denying it. The human being is made successor on earth, but that is not ownership; it is a trust regarding which he is tested. The animal is not a thing but a community with its own provision and its own praise. Benefit is legitimate; excess is not. A measure has been set, and breaking it is forbidden. And when the breakage becomes visible, the text does not search for a culprit — it says plainly: what the hands of people have earned.

Source: Qur'anic verses (M. Okuyan's Turkish rendering, Saheeh International in English) + kuranokuyan.com. Qur'an-centred, non-sectarian, cited.