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Surah Ali 'Imran — 3:54

وَمَكَرُوا۟ وَمَكَرَ ٱللَّهُ ۖ وَٱللَّهُ خَيْرُ ٱلْمَـٰكِرِينَ

Wa makaroo wa makaral laahu wallaahu khairul maakireen

They schemed, and God schemed — and God is the best of schemers.

Reflection

Arabic repeats a single word on purpose here, answering the plotters with their own term; the rhetoricians call this mushākala, shaping the reply to match the wording of the challenge. Classical commentators handled the word carefully, reading makr said of God as the overturning of a plan, since deceit belongs to the plotters alone. What that overturning consisted of arrives in the next verse.

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