﴿ بِسْمِ ٱللَّهِ ٱلرَّحْمَٰنِ ٱلرَّحِيمِ هَلْ أَتَىٰ عَلَى ٱلْإِنسَٰنِ حِينٌۭ مِّنَ ٱلدَّهْرِ لَمْ يَكُن شَيْـًۭٔا مَّذْكُورًا ﴾

“HAS THERE [not] been an endless span of time before man [appeared - a time] when he was not yet a thing to be thought of?”

Has there ever been — there has indeed been — for man Adam a period of time forty years in which he was a thing unmentioned? — he was during this period a fashioned in clay and not mentioned; alternatively what is meant by insān ‘man’ is the generic noun and by hīn ‘a period of time’ the period of gestation.