YOUR LORD INSPIRED THE BEE THAT.... (VERSE NO. 68 - 69)

      Here the tune and tone of the verses strangely change, and continuing with the mention of God's favours and bounties to Man; the speech turns on the BEE and HONEY, drawing our attention to how the little creature in such a mysterious way, fulfils God's order, and performs the duty assigned to him! :ِ

      ``Your Lord inspired the bee to build its home upon the mountains and trees, and among the habitations of Man on their lattice-works.''

      The Arabic, ``VAHY'' literally denotes inspiration but connotes to induce, or to put a message into the mind or heart by God. The instinct of creatures too, is some sort of a ``VAHY'' or inspiration that they receive from their Creator. Therefore, here in this verse the bee's instinct is referred to as God's inspiration.

      Now-a-days, Man has much more information about the wonderful civilization of bees than he had before. The way the bee builds its wonderful home or the honey-comb, with its hexagonal cells, and so geometrically perfect, upon the hills, on the trees, or even among the habitations of men, is one of the wonders of nature!

      The bee, by its instinct, eats the juice of various kinds of flowers and fruits, to make within its stomach the honey which it later stores it in those cells of wax.

      The bee's process of making honey is no less stranger than that of the cow's making milk! There are many important and meaningful points in this verses, some of which are as follows:ِ

 

1ِ HOW AND OF WHAT IS HONEY PRODUCED?

      By definition, honey is a sweet, syrupy carbohydrate solution, produced by the honeybee from flower nectar.

      The nectar is drawn into bee's tongue, or labium, and from there it is passed into the honey stomach of the bee, where salivery enzymes convert the cane suger in the nectar into dextrose and levulose, two invert sugar.

      Upon returning to the hive, the bee pours back the partially digested nectar into a cell of the comb. Next, ``house bees'' cause further chemical changes, by working the nectar in their mouth. Excess water is evaporated from the solution as the house bees fan their wings over the cell. Finally the honey is ready, and the house bees seal the cell with wax.

      The flavor and colour of honey are dependent on the flowers from which the nectar was taken.

 

 

2ِ THE SURE AND EVEN WAYS OF GOD

      Bees have divided themselves in various groups of workers.
      Each group's duty is to do a certain part of work to complete the whole process. As an instance of this, early in the morning, a group of researcher bees, in the vanguard of the honeybees get out of the hive to find the best rose-gardens and flowery fields. They then return to report to other bees what they have discovered. Researchers mark out the way to the flowery field or farm that have suggested so that their colleague may easily find the way out:ِ

      ``.... And follow the ways of your Lord easily.''

 

 

3ِ THE PLACE IN WHICH HONEY IS MADE

      The bees drew the nectar by their labium, and pass it into their honey stomach which is a wonderful little factory. In that factory with the help of salivery enzyms, the cane sugar in the nectar is converted:ِ 1)into, ``DEXTROSE'' which is a kind of crystalline sugar (C6H12O6), occuring in many plants and in the animal organism.

2) Besides that, the small factory produces a second type of crystalline sugar out of the nectar which is called, ``LEVULOSE'' or fruit sugar, occuring with difficulty in the honey, and in the most of the sweet fruits. It is produced by inversion of, ``SUCROSE''.

      Upon returning to the hive, the bee gushes back the partially processed nectar into a cell of the comb. It is worthy of note that this SUREH was revealed in Mecca where there was no plantation or flowers, nor bee and honey!

WHAT IS GOING ON IN THE BEE - HIVE?

(During day light hours in the summer, the BEE-HIVE is a scene of intense, yet orderly activities. A constant stream of workers pass in and out of the hive entrance. Those who enter, are laden with pollen (THE MASS OF MICROSPORES IN SEED PLANTS WHICH IS USUALLY IN THE FORM OF FINE YELLOW FLOUR) and nectar.

      Those leaving, are headed for flowers where they can pick up new loads. They sometimes travel to long distances from their hive in order to reach a particular kind of flower!

      Sometimes as far as 8 miles! The field workers are very hardy and active and tirelessly go about their task so much hard that soon their wings become tattered, and within a few months they become old and weak and worn out.

      Young workers serve as apprenticeship within the hive on indoor tasks, then they spend a few days near the hive entrance, getting their bearings, trying out their wings and defending the colony if necessary.

      Bees have no defensive soldiers as certain kinds of ants do have. In times of danger workers are drafted to fight intruders, and they usually sacrifice their lives by giving their single sting.

      The interior of the hive has little waste space. The bulk of the hive consists of hanging combs of six-sided cells in vertical rows in the two, placed back to back. Between the rows in the hanging comb, are narrow passage ways, barely large enough for a bee to squeeze through. The smallest cells are used as nurseries for worker LAVAE, and pollen storage. Larger cells function as nurseries for drones, and as bins for honey. Drones are the males of the honeybee. They have no sting and gather no honey. They live on the labors of others. The largest cells are royal suites in which the future queen will born.

      The workers who carry on the routine courses of the hive, each perform a special task. Some are housemaids, keeping the passage ways clean and free of litter. They also clean and polish each cell before an egg is placed in it. Others are nursemaids, taking care of the new born bees. Each of the helpless, blind, and limbless larvae, stretches its head with open mouth, waiting to be fed with pollen and honey, brought from the storage bin by the nursemaids! This never ending task is tremendous, for, the young bees have incredible appetites. Each larvae increases its weight 1500 times in six days! On the seventh day it stops eating and a cap is placed over the cell, and the larvae constructs a cocoon. (i.e. an envelope largely of silk) Then from the cocoon it will emerge as an adult bee! Other workers serve as carpenters and repairmen, building new combs and cells, as the population of the hive increases and new storage bins for mounting the influx of pollen and nectar.

      The queen bee does not rule the hive in the usual sense. She is carefully looked after however, since upon her depends the future existence of the community. The queen is actually an egg-laying machine, producing hundreds of thousands of eggs in her lifetime of three or four years. At maximum production, she can lay about 1800 eggs a day! There is usually only one adult queen in the hive at a time.

QUOTED FROM INTERNATIONAL ENCYCLOPEDIA

AND OTHER REFERENCESTRANSLATOR'S NOTE)

 

4ِ THE COLOURS OF HONEY

      The colour of honey depends on the flowers from which the nectar was taken. The honey may have a dark brown colour if it is produced from buck wheat and heather nectar. The light-coloured aromatic honey is produced from clover, orange, thyme, and sage nectar. We know that colour increases beauty, shows the food or drink delicious, and incites the appetite and interest for a food.

 

5ِ HONEY IS A HEALING MEDICINE

      Vegetables and flowers are the main sources of many medicines and drugs, and generally have some sort of curative quality, most of which are still unknown to Man. Experiences have shown that, honey too, has many medical benefits and is endowed with many preventive and curative properties:ِ

      Honey is easily attracted by the blood, and serves to refine it.
It prevents infections in the stomach. It serves to control and regulate sleep. It is a cure for constipation. Honey cures coughing, and is used in curing ulcer of abdomen and duodenum.

      Morris Metterling the author of the great work on HONEY BEE has said:ِ

      ``If to-day the BEES perish suddenly; their death will cause more than a million kinds of our plants, flowers, and vegetations to die and destroy! This is because honeybees are essential for the pollination of many cultivated fruits, including apple cherry, pulm, and pear. They also pollinate berries and clover.