Some Thoughts on S 96:1-5

1 Read in the name of your lord who created, 2 Created man from blood clots. 3 Read and your lord is the most generous, 4 Who taught by the pen, 5 Taught man what he did not know.

Verse one does not identify this 'lord' of the author's. Was it Allah?

Narrated Jundab bin `Abdullah:

Gabriel did not come to the Prophet (for some time) and so one of the Quraish women said, "His Satan has deserted him." So came the Divine Revelation: "By the forenoon And by the night When it is still! Your Lord (O Muhammad) has neither Forsaken you Nor hated you." (93.1-3)

https://sunnah.com/bukhari/19/5

The hadith suggests that Jibril was his lord, his devil lord. In another hadith a qarin commands him.

Abdullah b. Mas'ud reported that Allah's Messenger (ﷺ) said:

There is none amongst you with whom is not an attache from amongst the jinn (devil). They (the Companions) said: Allah's Messenger, with you too? Thereupon he said: Yes, but Allah helps me against him and so I am safe from his hand and he does not command me but for good.

https://sunnah.com/muslim:2814a

Man was created from 'alaq. This is the collective form of 'alaqah, a blood clot, according to this page: علقة - Wiktionary, the free dictionary So we're looking at a number of blood clots. As 'man' should include Adam, where does the Quran say that he was created from any number of blood clots? Whose blood would it be?

The same page however gives one definition for 'alaq as "clay that clings to the hand". Almaany has: "- blood clot; thrombus" علق In English - Translation and Meaning in English Arabic Dictionary of All terms Page 1

To say that I was created from either a blood clot or from clay would of course be an error. And why doesn't the author say that man was created from a drop of semen (S 23:14)?

He is directed to read. Read what? In non-Quranic hadith we find:

" The angel came to him in it and asked him to read. The Prophet (ﷺ) replied, "I do not know how to read." (The Prophet (ﷺ) added), "The angel caught me (forcefully) and pressed me so hard that I could not bear it anymore. He then released me and again asked me to read, and I replied, "I do not know how to read," whereupon he caught me again and pressed me a second time till I could not bear it anymore. He then released me and asked me again to read, but again I replied, "I do not know how to read (or, what shall I read?)." Thereupon he caught me for the third time and pressed me and then released me and said, "Read: In the Name of your Lord, Who has created (all that exists). Has created man from a clot. Read and Your Lord is Most Generous...up to..... ..that which he knew not." (96.15)"

https://sunnah.com/bukhari:6982

In the Sirah we find, as quoted in an Answering Islam article:

… When it was the night on which God honoured him with his mission and showed mercy on His servants thereby, Gabriel brought him the command of God. ‘He came to me,’ said the apostle of God, ‘while I was asleep, with a coverlet brocade whereon was some writing, and said, "Read!" I said, "What shall I read?" He pressed me with IT so tightly that I thought it was death; then he let me go and said, "Read!" I said, "What shall I read?" He pressed me with IT again so that I thought it was death; then he let me go and said "Read!" I said, "What shall I read?" He pressed me with IT the third time so that I thought it was death and said, "Read!" I said, "What then shall I read?" – and this I said only to deliver myself from him, lest he should do the same to me again… So I read it, and he departed from me. And I awoke from my sleep, and it was as though these words were written on my heart…’ (The Life of Muhammad, A Translation of Ibn Ishaq’s Sirat Rasul Allah, with introduction and notes by Alfred Guillaume [Karachi Oxford University Press, Karachi, Tenth Impression 1995], p. 106; bold, capital and italic emphasis ours) To Read or Recite? That is the Question!

This 'lord' taught man by means of the pen; in what way? What was written down? What was taught? The Jalalayn for verses 4 and 5 say:

Who taught the art of script by the pen — the first to write with it was the prophet Enoch Idrīs peace be upon him —

taught man al-insān the generic what he did not know before he was taught in the way of guidance the art of writing crafts and so on.

The Tanwîr al-Miqbâs min Tafsîr Ibn ‘Abbâs:

(Who teacheth by the pen) Who teaches writing by the pen,

(Teacheth man) writing with the pen (that which be knew not) before this; it is also said: He taught man the names of all things which he previously did not know. altafsir.com

Wikipedia:

1-5 The first revelation[edit]

Main article: Muhammad's first revelation

The first five verses of this sura are believed by some to be the first verses of the Quran claimed to be related by Muhammad. He received them while on a retreat in a mountain cave at Hira, just outside the city of Mecca in 610 CE. A few commentators disagree with this account, claiming that the first revelation was the beginning of surat al-Muddaththir or surat al-Fatiha, but theirs is a minority position. Moreover, the term ‘Insan’ which is translated to man or human appears 65 times in the Qur'an, applying to both sexes of mankind, a generic ‘man’.[4] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Al-Alaq

Chronological Order of the Qur'an - WikiIslam

Further reading regarding the author's literacy:

Muhammad – Literate Still!

Muhammad – Literate Still! [Round 2]