Are there Metaphors in the Qur'an?

Question :

I often read in books of Tafsir and in other books that a certain letter is 'extra'. Like in the saying of Allah Almighty:
"There is nothing like unto Him (Ka-mithlihi), and He is the All Hearer, the All Seer.

In this verse, they say that the letter Kaf in Ka-mithlihi is 'extra'. One of my teachers told me that there is nothing in the Qur'an that can be called "extra" nor "deficient," and that there is nothing in the Qur'an that can be called a metaphor. If what my teacher said is true, then what about Allah's saying?

"And ask the town".
And:
"And their hearts drank of the calf because of their disbelief."

Answer:

The correct opinion in this issue the one held by discerning scholars is that there is no metaphor in the Qur'an, at least not in the sense that Arabic Rhetoricians understand; rather, everything in the Qur'an is real, in its particularization.

When the scholars of Tafsir say that such and such letter is extra, they mean that it is extra from the aspect of Arabic Grammar, not from the aspect of its meaning. In fact, every letter of the Qur'an adds meaning, and people who speak Arabic know this, because it was revealed in their language.

"There is nothing like unto Him (Ka-mithlihi), and He is the All Hearer, the All Seer."

The letter Kaf in Ka-mithlihi gives additional meaning, which is that it stresses the negation of "similarity" from Allâh. So this gives more stress than merely saying "there is nothing like Him."

You gave the example of:
"And ask the town"

Here one directly understands that the people of the town are meant, and not the town itself, and understanding that is possible because of the vastness and flexibility of the Arabic language, and not because this is a metaphor according to the definition of the Arabic Rhetoricians. Although it can be called a metaphor, it is of the type that is allowed according to them, not the type that is not allowed.

The same with Allah's saying:
"And their hearts drank of the calf because of their disbelief."

It merely means the love they had for it, and it is a way of implying the utmost form of love, and this expression is well known to imply this meaning according to the people of the language it is addressing. This usage is a type of metaphoric abbreviated statement that makes the meaning in question clear.

And with Allah is the facilitation to do what is right.