Al-Qari'ah, "The Striking Calamity," is the hundred-and-first surah — 11 verses revealed in Mecca.1 It opens by repeating its name as a question: "The Striking Calamity — what is the Striking Calamity? And what can make you know what is the Striking Calamity?"
What it is about
The surah answers with two images of total collapse: "It is the Day when people will be like moths, dispersed, and the mountains will be like wool, fluffed up."2 Then it turns to the scales. "Then as for one whose scales are heavy [with good deeds], he will be in a pleasant life. But as for one whose scales are light, his refuge will be an abyss. And what can make you know what that is? It is a Fire, intensely hot."3
Why it matters
Al-Qari'ah reduces the Day of Judgment to its essentials: the world undone, and each life weighed. Its images of people scattered like moths and mountains blown like wool show how fragile everything that seems solid is, while its scales teach that what finally matters is the weight of a person's deeds. To read Al-Qari'ah in Arabic with translations and recitation, open it on Quran.com.