Randy Gardner, a seventeen-year-old in San Diego, stayed awake for about 264 hours in 1964. That is eleven days, for a school science project. By the end he could barely string a sentence together.
We spend about a third of our lives asleep, and we cannot do without it. Al-Qayyūm is the One who holds everything up, and never needs to rest.
Start with what we know
Start with something we know. Then take away everything it needs. What is left is not a bigger version of us: it is the Name.
Episode 1
In us
Sleep is not optional. Randy Gardner's record in 1964 is still quoted because nobody should try to beat it. After a few days without sleep he had trouble focusing, remembering and speaking, and Guinness World Records stopped accepting attempts for safety reasons. Most of us need seven to nine hours a night and spend roughly a third of our lives asleep. Night-shift nurses, doctors and police keep our hospitals and streets running round the clock. They manage it only by working in rotas, handing over to each other, because no single person can stay awake for long. Every human carer has to sleep.
Episode 2
In nature
Great frigatebirds soar over the ocean for weeks without landing. In 2016 a team led by Niels Rattenborg of the Max Planck Institute fitted them with tiny brain recorders. During flights of up to ten days, the birds slept for only about 42 minutes a day, in bursts of seconds, sometimes with one half of the brain at a time. On land they slept more than twelve hours a day. It is a breathtaking adaptation. But even the frigatebird must sleep, and it pays for its long flights with a sleep debt.
Episode 3
At our best
The International Space Station has been continuously crewed since 2 November 2000: by November 2025 there had been 25 years of unbroken human presence in orbit. It is the longest continuous human outpost beyond Earth. But it does not hold itself up. It is resupplied by cargo ships, its crew rotate home, and its orbit has to be boosted regularly because the thin upper atmosphere slowly drags it down. Even the Sun, which holds the solar system together with its gravity and light, burns its own fuel. Everything we know is held up by something.
Episode 4
The Break
Every keeper we know needs fuel, rest, maintenance, a rota and support underneath. Every keeper needs keeping. Al-Qayyūm stands by Himself and holds up everything else, without a pause. The Prophet said that God does not sleep, and it is not fitting for Him to sleep (Muslim 179). The Throne Verse says it best: “Allah! There is no God save Him, the Alive, the Eternal. Neither slumber nor sleep overtaketh Him.” (Qur'an 2:255, Pickthall).
From the tradition: Muslim (API 445): 'the Exalted and Mighty God does not sleep, and it does not befit Him to sleep'. Bukhari 1120: 'You are the Holder (qayyim) of the heavens and the earth'.
Watch and listen
Films, documentaries and voices that reach towards this Name. Each links out to where you can watch it.
One day the Prophet Muhammad ﷺ (peace be upon him) turned to Ubayy ibn Kaʿb, one of the Companions best known for his knowledge of the Qur'an. He asked him a question: Abū l-Mundhir, which verse in the Book of God do you think is the greatest?
Ubayy gave the polite answer: God and His Messenger know best.
The Prophet asked again. Abū l-Mundhir, which verse in the Book of God do you think is the greatest?
This time Ubayy answered: “God: there is no god but He, the Ever-Living, the Sustainer of all.”
The Prophet struck him lightly on the chest, a gesture of delight, and said: may knowledge be a joy to you, Abū l-Mundhir. (Muslim 810)
The verse Ubayy chose is Āyat al-Kursī, the Throne Verse (2:255). Many Muslims recite it before they sleep and when they leave home. It names God as al-Ḥayy and al-Qayyūm, and then says that neither drowsiness nor sleep overtakes Him. The night prayer of the Prophet also called God “the Sustainer of the heavens and the earth and all that is in them” (Bukhari 1120). For people about to close their eyes, it is a comfort: someone is awake.
What each faith says
Read:
Judaism
“He will not suffer thy foot to be moved; He that keepeth thee will not slumber. Behold, He that keepeth Israel Doth neither slumber nor sleep.”
Psalm 121 is one of the Songs of Ascents, sung by pilgrims climbing to Jerusalem. It says that the Guardian of Israel “doth neither slumber nor sleep”. Many Jewish parents and travellers say this psalm for protection.
The traditional bedtime Shema adds a prayer to God “who makes us lie down in peace”: we sleep, and God keeps watch.
Christianity
“He is before all things, and in him all things are held together.”
Christians share Psalm 121 and pray it in many churches, especially at night services like Compline. The New Testament speaks of God sustaining all things.
The letter to the Colossians says of Christ that “in him all things are held together” (1:17). Hebrews speaks of “upholding all things by the word of his power” (1:3). Christians understand this through their belief in Christ as divine.
Islam
“Neither slumber nor sleep overtaketh Him. Unto Him belongeth whatsoever is in the heavens and whatsoever is in the earth.”
Al-Qayyūm appears three times in the Qur'an, each time with al-Ḥayy. It comes in the Throne Verse (2:255), at the start of Āl ʿImrān, “The Family of ʿImrān” (3:2), and in 20:111, where “all faces will be humbled before the Ever-Living, the Sustainer”. The word means both self-standing and holding others up.
The Prophet taught a short prayer for times of distress: Yā Ḥayyu yā Qayyūm, bi-raḥmatika astaghīth, “O Ever-Living, O Sustainer, by Your mercy I seek help” (Tirmidhi 3524).
Same and different
Psalm 121 and the Throne Verse say almost the same thing: God neither slumbers nor sleeps. All three faiths pray at night in that trust. Christians also say that Christ holds all things together, which Jews and Muslims, who do not believe Christ is divine, do not say. Each faith keeps its own night prayer: the Jewish bedtime Shema, Christian Compline, and the Throne Verse many Muslims recite before sleep.
A moment to reflect
Who keeps watch over you while you sleep, and who do you keep watch over?
What does it feel like to know that something is being held up without you?
What do you do, say or think just before you fall asleep?
Watch
PBS Nature's octopus filmed changing colour as it sleeps: even the cleverest animals need rest.
Terra Mater on the frigatebird, which snatches seconds of sleep while flying for days.
Do it together
neighbours / faith groupsNight-shift thank-you
Make cards or a small food parcel for a local hospital, care home or fire station night shift. Read Psalm 121 and Qur'an 2:255 together before you deliver them.
familiesWho never sleeps?
At bedtime, take turns naming things that are awake while you sleep: owls, bakers, the Moon, the nurse on the ward. End with Psalm 121:4 or the Throne Verse.
anyone / faith groupsCompline by candlelight
Many cathedrals and parish churches sing Compline, the short last service of the day, often by candlelight and in near darkness. Go along once, or read it at home: a few psalms, a prayer for protection through the night, and silence.
Episode 1
