وَالۡعَصۡرِ ۙ اِنَّ الۡاِنۡسَانَ لَفِیۡ خُسۡرٍ اِلَّا الَّذِیۡنَ اٰمَنُوۡا وَ عَمِلُوا الصّٰلِحٰتِ وَ تَوَاصَوۡا بِالۡحَقِّ ۬ۙ وَ تَوَاصَوۡا بِالصَّبۡرِ
“By the fleeting Time; surely, man is in a state of loss; except those who believe and do good works, and exhort one another to accept truth, and exhort one another to be steadfast.”
Here, Allah states:
“By the Time,” i.e. the era of the Holy Prophet, peace and blessings of Allah be upon him. Our unwise opponents of the present day and age object that the Holy Quran has taken oaths on created things, while it has prohibited the rest of us from doing so. In places, it swears by the fig, at other places, the night and day, and still at other places, by the earth and even by the human soul. These allegations have a very negative effect.
It ought to be remembered that it is common practice in the Holy Quran and in the way of God that in order to prove and establish various matters of ideological nature, He makes reference to such things whose inner properties are evidenced by clear, manifest and visible proof. Hence, to swear by such creation is to present them as an argument and precedent.
(Hazrat Mirza Ghulam Ahmadas, Malfuzat, Vol. 1, pp. 222-223)