# Housefly

> Can only suck fluids.

- Field: Zoology
- Level: Intermediate
- Qur'an passage: Quran 22:73
- URL: https://dailymuslim.org/quran-miracles/housefly

In the Quran if a housefly stole something from you can never get it back. Skeptics claim that whoever wrote the Quran made a mistake; we can always catch the fly and get it back. Today scientists confirm that if a housefly stole something then it is already digested, now it is different material.

Houseflies cannot carry food away and they can only feed on liquids. They secret enzymes to break down solids and then suck it as a liquid.

> Houseflies play an important ecological role in breaking down and recycling organic matter. Adults are mainly carnivorous; their primary food is animal matter, carrion, and feces, but they also consume milk, sugary substances, and rotting fruit and vegetables. Solid foods are softened with saliva before being sucked up.

— [Wikipedia, Housefly, 2020](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Housefly)

Solid foods are broken down by enzymes before being sucked. So whatever a housefly takes is already digested. This was known recently, however this was portrayed in the Quran 1400 years before it was discovered.

## Qur'an passage · Quran 22:73

٧٣ يَا أَيُّهَا النَّاسُ ضُرِبَ مَثَلٌ فَاسْتَمِعُوا لَهُ ۚ إِنَّ الَّذِينَ تَدْعُونَ مِنْ دُونِ اللَّهِ لَنْ يَخْلُقُوا ذُبَابًا وَلَوِ اجْتَمَعُوا لَهُ ۖ وَإِنْ يَسْلُبْهُمُ الذُّبَابُ شَيْئًا لَا يَسْتَنْقِذُوهُ مِنْهُ ۚ ضَعُفَ الطَّالِبُ وَالْمَطْلُوبُ

*O people! A parable is presented, so listen to it: Those you invoke besides Allah will never create a housefly, even if they banded together for that purpose. And if the housefly steals anything from them, they cannot recover it from it. Weak are the pursuer and the pursued.*

"Weak are the pursuer and the pursued" The pursuer is weak because he is missing what the housefly stole. But it also says that the pursued, that is whatever the housefly took, is also weak. Today we know why it is weak, because it is already digested.

### Additional references

> Original article: Miracles of Quran, shared under the source website’s no-copyright notice. The linked scientific and interpretive notes below are separate additions.

— [Miracles of Quran — About Us](https://www.miracles-of-quran.com/about.html)

### Wikipedia — reuse licence

> The original article’s quoted housefly passage remains attributed to Wikipedia. Wikipedia text is reusable under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 licence, subject to its terms.

— [Wikipedia — reuse licence](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/)

### Additional evidence — summary

> The University of California’s Integrated Pest Management program confirms that adult houseflies have sponging mouthparts. To eat solid food, they first liquefy it with saliva and may also regurgitate onto it before taking up the resulting liquid. This directly supports the article’s description of the fly’s feeding method.

— [University of California IPM — House Fly](https://ipm.ucanr.edu/home-and-landscape/flies/)

### Peer-reviewed salivary study — housefly feeding

> A 2025 peer-reviewed study reports that houseflies have a sponging proboscis adapted to fluid or semi-fluid food. Their saliva contains several classes of enzymes, and a fly can place saliva on a solid surface to help break down and liquefy food before ingesting the mixture. ‘Already digested’ is therefore best understood as partly broken down outside the mouth; it does not mean that every stolen substance is completely digested or impossible to recover in every physical sense.

— [Peer-reviewed salivary study — housefly feeding](https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC11889141/)

### Quran.com and Ibn Kathir — context of 22:73

> Quran 22:73 explicitly introduces a parable: the beings worshipped besides Allah cannot create even a fly and cannot recover what it takes. Ibn Kathir explains the passage as showing the weakness of idols and their worshippers. Housefly feeding biology can make the image more vivid, but the verse itself does not mention saliva, enzymes, or digestion; treating those details as the verse’s intended scientific claim is a modern reflection rather than the classical tafsir’s stated meaning.

— [Quran.com and Ibn Kathir — context of 22:73](https://quran.com/22%3A73/tafsirs/en-tafisr-ibn-kathir)

## Ponder

**How could an illiterate man who lived 1400 years ago have known that a housefly can only take digested food?**

## Sources and further reading

- [Quran 22:73 · Quran.com](https://quran.com/22/73)
- [University of California IPM — House Fly](https://ipm.ucanr.edu/home-and-landscape/flies/)
- [Miracles of Quran](https://www.miracles-of-quran.com/housefly.html)

— Miracle of Quran, Daily Muslim · https://dailymuslim.org/quran-miracles/housefly