Imagine spending your holiday on a seashore. With the sun shining bright and a cool breeze sweeping past your hair as you walk carefree with no work stress, you spot a beautiful, almost transparent, slimy umbrella-like animal swimming, gliding smoothly just a few meters away. Well, that is a Jellyfish! They are beautiful, elegant, almost see-through marine animals resembling gelatinous umbrellas with long threads called tentacles attached to their bodies. They look so unreal that it feels like they are some mysterious creatures from a Disney movie. But watch out, be careful, don’t you dare get in their way, lest you may experience an excruciating, sometimes deadly sting which is present in their tentacles. Let us explore some amazing facts about them. 

Jellyfish is a common name given to the medusa-phase, a stage in the life cycle of some animals of the subphylum Medusozoa of the phylum Cnidaria. They are plankton, not fish.[i] They derive their name from their gelatinous body, which is sometimes colored, transparent, and luminescent. The transparent jelly-like umbrella bell is a hollow structure called mesoglea and is made up of 95% of water.[ii] They vary in shape and size. Their life cycle is very complicated. From larvae to polyps growing into ephyrae, reaching the medusa phase, which lasts only three to six months. 

Jellyfish pass through four life cycle stages which are far more complex than described here. They are invertebrates and don’t have bones, brains, and hearts. Smaller jellyfish feed on zooplankton and algae, whereas large ones eat crustaceans and bigger aquatic animals.[iii] They use their mouth to eat food, discard waste and squirt out water to propel themselves.[iv] A group of jellyfish is called a “smack.”[v] The Chironex fleckeri, also called the sea wasp, is one of the most lethal jellyfish for humans.[vi]

The wondrous design and appearance of the jellyfish have inspired scientists to develop a similar autonomous robotic known as RoboJelly. A RoboJelly is a bowl-shaped device clothed with a rubbery artificial skin resembling a jellyfish and moving like one. The information on the cited website reveals that Virginia Tech has collaborated with four universities on a multi-year five-million-dollar deal to bring the idea of an artificial jellyfish to life. They aim to mimic jellyfish in shape, size, weight, and motion so that the RoboJelly can be used as military aides, in monitoring the oceans and seas, and for cleaning purposes.[vii]

Massive teams are brilliantly observing the minute details, movements, and developments of jellyfish so that the robotic ones can be made as close to the original ones as possible. We know from this that an artificial jellyfish has to have a maker. It cannot occur on its own. Millions of dollars are being spent yearly to study and copy them mechanically. Does it not make you question the maker of the real jellyfish? Is it not reasonable to say that the real jellyfish must have a maker too? Even if all developers and scientists come together to create the like of a living jellyfish that grows and reproduces, do you think they will be able to do that with all of the artificial intelligence they have developed so far or in the future? Just as a random accident cannot in any way bring tools, machine parts, and instruction manual together and create a robotic jellyfish on its own, how is it possible for a random accident or chance to pull off cells, matter, etc., together and turn it into a living jellyfish? Talking of evolution, do you think a robotic jellyfish can evolve itself? Of course not. Then how can a real-life jellyfish evolve itself, in other words, create itself? For something to create itself, it needs first to exist, and if it exists already, why would it create itself? If random chance and nature are not responsible for creating these unique and elegant creatures, then who created them? 

It is clear from the above discussion that jellyfish must be the creation of the one who is All-Wise (Al-Hakīm). Its creator must be the Best of Fashioners (Al-Mușawwir), for He has crafted them with so much perfection and beauty that jellyfish seem almost unreal. The jellyfish is pointing to its Creator (Al-Khāliq), who has Absolute Knowledge (Al-`Aleem) of everything because only the One with absolute knowledge can create such amazing creatures. The tiny cells inside the jellyfish are interconnected. It is in connection with that one living cell that the single jellyfish has come into existence. So, this means that at the micro-level, someone extremely Powerful (al-Qādir) and the Owner of the Dominion (Mālik al-Mulk) controls those tiny cells inside the jellyfish as well. The fact that jellyfish is dependent upon other living and non-living things at large, like crustaceans, algae, water, sun, air, etc., for its existence proves that all of those things have also been created by that One (Al-Wāhid) and Unique (Al-Ahad) Sustainer (Al-Qayyūm) only. 

Do you not think the ocean would look incomplete if all jellyfish were removed? Apart from the benefits of jellyfish, they add to the magnificence of the surreal beauty of life underwater. They play an essential role in the food chain and the ecosystem. Their swimming ability is minimal; hence, they tend to flow with the ocean currents in the horizontal direction. This teaches us that we, too, shall flow with the tides of time without complaining and embrace the ups and downs of life. Jellyfish are indeed one of the Almighty’s many bounties. Therefore, we should reflect (fikr) on them and take a moment to show our gratitude (shukr) to their Creator by remembering (dhikr) Him all the time. This will help us become kinder and more compassionate towards them and the rest of His creation because we now know that we are being watched over by a Supreme Being every second, which is Powerful enough to bring the entire universe to life in such perfect harmony.

[i] Watson, Op. Cit. [ii] Wikipedia contributors, Jellyfish (Jul 3, 2022). Accessed 04 Jul 2022, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Jellyfish&oldid=1096243892 [iii] Stephanie Watson, How Jellyfish Work? (Apr 5, 2021) Accessed 04 July, 2022 from https://animals.howstuffworks.com/marine-life/jellyfish.htm [iv] Facts Just for Kids. Jellyfish Facts for Kids. Accessed 04 Jul 2022 from https://www.factsjustforkids.com/animal-facts/jellyfish-facts-for-kids/ [v] Wikipedia [vi] Ibid. [vii] Off Grid Energy Independence, Progress with Autonomous Robotic Jellyfish. (Apr 1, 2013). Accessed 04 July 2022 from https://www.offgridenergyindependence.com/articles/5304/progress-with-autonomous-robotic-jellyfish