How can one respond to someone who claims that the noble verse: (Neither does the sun overtake the moon, nor does the night outstrip the day; and each floats in an orbit) contradicts the phenomena of eclipses and the existence of night during the day?

First: The Holy Quran affirms that God created the universe with precision and perfection, and that what happens in the universe bears witness to His greatness. The Arabs, who witnessed solar and lunar eclipses during the time of the Prophet Muhammad, peace be upon him, did not object to the Quranic verses that deny the sun's overtaking of the moon. This indicates that their understanding of the verse was different from the common, incorrect understanding.

Second: The meaning of the noble verse is that the sun should not rise at night because it is the time for the moon to rise, and the moon should not rise during the day because it is the time for the sun to rise. This understanding is supported by the statements of scholars such as Imam Ibn Jarir, Ibn Kathir, and Al-Tahir Ibn Ashur, who interpreted the verse as negating one overtaking the other in its specific temporal domain, or negating their collision. There is no contradiction between the verse and the phenomena of lunar and solar eclipses, because these phenomena are not the "overtaking" (idrak) intended in the verse.