Darkness in the Depth of Seas and the Internal Waves

“Or (the state of a disbeliever) is like the darkness in a vast deep sea, overwhelmed with a great wave topped by a great wave, topped by dark clouds, darkness, one above another, if a man stretches out his hand, he can hardly see it! And he for whom Allah has not appointed light, for him there is no light.”

[Al Qur'an 24:40]

Humans are unable to dive unaided underwater for more than 20-40 metres, and cannot survive in the deep oceanic regions at a depth of more than 200 metres. For these reasons, scientists have only recently been able to discover detailed pieces of information about seas and oceans. However, the above quoted verse is certainly one of the miracles of the Holy Qur'an that such information was given at a time when no equipment was there to enable man to dive into the depths of the oceans.

The general environment in deep seas is described in a book, named ‘Oceans’, as:
“The darkness in deep seas and oceans is found around a depth of 200 meters and below. At this depth, there is almost no light. Below a depth of 1000 meters there is no light at all.”
This darkness in deep seas and oceans is because of the following reason:
A light ray is composed of seven colours - Violet, Indigo, Blue, Green, Yellow, Orange and Red. A light ray undergoes refraction when it hits water. The upper 10 to 15 metres of water absorb the red colour. Therefore, if a diver is 25 metres under water and gets wounded, he would not be able to see the red colour of his blood, because the red colour does not reach this depth. Similarly, orange rays are absorbed at 30 to 50 metres, yellow at 50 to 100 metres, green at 100 to 200 metres, and finally, blue, violet and indigo above 200 metres. Due to successive disappearance of colour, one layer after another, the ocean progressively becomes darker, i.e. darkness takes place in layers of light. Below a depth of 1000 meters there is complete darkness.

“…darkness in a vast deep sea, overwhelmed with a great wave topped by a great wave…” draws our attention to another miracle of the Qur'an.
Scientists have recently discovered that there are internal waves, which occur on density interfaces between layers of different densities. These internal waves cover the deep waters of seas and oceans because deep water has a higher density than the water above it. Internal waves act like surface waves. They can break, just like surface waves. Internal waves cannot be seen by the human eye, but they can be detected by studying temperature or salinity changes at a given location.

And finally, “…topped by (dark) clouds, darkness, one above another...”
These clouds as explained are barriers one over the other that causes darkness by absorption of colours at different levels.

The Holy Qur'an runs absolutely parallel to the recently discovered facts. Without research, one can only see the waves on the surface of the sea. It is impossible for one to know about the internal waves beneath the sea. More than 1400 years ago a normal human being could not explain this phenomenon in so much detail. Certainly, this fact, which scientists have discovered very recently, shows once again that the Holy Qur'an is the word of God.