In The Name of Allah,
the Beneficent and the Most Merciful
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Volume 7: Surah Ale-Imran,
Verses 176-180
And let not those grieve
you who fall into unbelief hastily; surely they can do no harm to Allah at
all; Allah intends that He should not give them any portion on the
hereafter, and they shall have a great chastisement (176). Surely
those who have bought unbelief at the price of faith shall do no harm at
all to Allah, and they shall have a painful chastisement (177). And
let not those who disbelieve think that Our granting them respite is good
for their souls; We grant them respite only that they may increase in
sins; and they shall have a disgraceful chastisement (178). On no
account will Allah leave the believers in the condition which you are in
until He separates the evil from the good; nor is Allah going to make you
acquainted with the unseen, but Allah chooses of His messengers whom He
pleases; therefore believe in Allah and His messengers; and if you believe
and guard (against evil), then you shall have a great reward
(179). And let not those deem, who are niggardly in giving away that
which Allah has granted them out of His grace, that it is good for them;
nay, it is worse for them; they shall have that whereof they were
niggardly made to encircle their necks on the Resurrection Day; and
Allah's is the heritage of the heavens and the earth; and Allah is aware
of what you do (180).
COMMENTARY
The verses have some
connection with those revealed about the battle of Uhud. These and
especially the first four of them are probably a sort of epilogue to the
preceding ones. The most important theme of the preceding talk was the
principle of test and trial, which Allah makes His servants to undergo.
Therefore, these are like the sum total of the verses of Uhud. Allah
describes here that the test and trial is an established and continual
system from which no one - neither a believer nor an unbeliever - can
escape; Allah will certainly test both in order to expose and unveil the
hidden realities of their souls; in this way the unbeliever will become
totally fit for the Fire, and the evil will become separated from the good
in the believer.
QUR'AN: And let not those grieve
you . . . and they shall have a painful chastisement:
The verse consoles the
Prophet and removes sorrow by describing the reality of the whole
affair. The unbelievers compete with each other in rushing towards
disbelief; they help one another to extinguish the light of Allah and
sometimes even succeed in overpowering the believers. It sometimes grieves
the believers, as it seems as if they (the unbelievers) have scored
against Allah by thwarting His plan to make the word of truth triumphant.
But if the believer ponders on the system of general and all-encompassing
test, he will become sure that it is Allah Who is victorious; and that all
persons are relentlessly proceeding to their destination in order that
their creative and legislative guidance to their goals may be
completed. The unbeliever is driven to that goal by the health and
strength, bounty and comfort that he is provided with - Allah in this way
draws him nearer to his destruction in degrees and unfolds His plan
against him - enabling him to go to the furthest possible limit of
transgression and disobedience. The believer on the other hand is
continuously scraped through test and trial until his belief and faith is
cleansed from all rust and pollution, and he becomes absolutely pure for
Allah; while the unbeliever's polytheistic tendencies are purged of every
shade of belief and he falls down where other friends of false deities and
leaders of infidelity have gone.
The verse therefore means as
follows: You should not grieve on account of those who proceed with
increasing haste towards disbelief. Why should you grieve? Do you think as
if they can do any harm to Allah? Certainly you cannot think so, because
they cannot do any harm to Allah; they are under complete control of
Allah, and He is driving them in their lives' journey to their goal where
they will be left with no portion, no share, in the hereafter (and it is
the final limit of their infidelity); and they shall have a painful
chastisement. The prohibition, therefore, in the clause, "And let not
those grieve you", is of advisory nature; the clause, "surely they
can do no harm to Allah", describes the reason of that prohibition;
and the next words, "Allah intends that He should not give them . .
.", explains why they are unable to do any harm to Allah.
Thereafter Allah makes it
clear that no unbeliever - whether he hastens to fall into disbelief or
not - can do any harm to Him. The next verse thus states the general
principle after mentioning a particular case. This may serve as the reason
for the preceding prohibition, "And let not those grieve you", or
it may be treated as the reason of the preceding reason, "surely they
can do no harm "—because it has a general import which may explain the
reason of a particular reason. The meaning thus will be as follows: We
have said that those who fall into disbelief hastily can do no harm to
Allah, because no unbeliever can do any harm to Him.
QUR'AN: And let not those who
disbelieve think. . . a disgraceful chastisement:
After putting the Prophet's
mind at rest regarding the unbelievers' falling into unbelief hastily, and
explaining that in all this they are in fact subsequent to Allah's plan,
Who is driving them to a stage where they shall have no share in the
hereafter, Allah now turns to the unbelievers themselves. He tells them
that they should not be happy with the respite granted to them by Allah,
because Allah through this respite is giving them a chance to pile up sins
over sins, and behind it all there is a disgraceful chastisement waiting
for them — there is nothing for them except shame and ignominy in the
hereafter. This all is based on the divinely established system of
completion that every creature should bring his potentials to fruition,
according to his own choice.
QUR'AN: On no account will Allah
leave the believers then you shall have a great reward:
Now the Speaker turns to the
believers. He explains to them that the system of test and trial covers
them too, in order that they too should reach the stage of completion; and
the purified believer may be distinguished from the impure, and evil and
wicked ones may be separated from the good and virtuous ones.
The next sentence aims at
removing a possible misconception. It could be assumed that there was
another way of distinguishing evil from good; that is, Allah could let the
believers know who was wicked and evil so that they could avoid him. Thus,
they could easily be saved all these troubles and turmoil which they had
to suffer because of their commingling with hypocrites and those whose
hearts were diseased. Allah erases such erroneous impression by pointing
out that He has exclusively reserved the knowledge of unseen to Himself,
He does not reveal it to anyone except to some chosen messengers whom He
might acquaint with it. This is the import of the sentence, "nor is
Allah going to make you acquainted with the unseen, but, Allah chooses of
His messengers whom He pleases".
Thereafter, Allah says to
them: As there is no escape from test and trial, nor from turning the
potentials into accomplishments, it is in your interest that you should
believe in Allah and His messengers, so that you should be counted among
the good ones - and not among the evil ones. But mere belief is not
sufficient to preserve the blessedness of the life, it is also necessary
to support it with good deeds that would raise the belief up to Allah and
preserve its blessings - it is then that the reward would be complete. It
was with this connotation in view that the Qur'an first said,
"therefore believe in Allah and His messengers", and then completed
it with the next clause, "and if you believe and guard (against evil),
then you shall have a great reward".
It is evident from this
verse that: -
First: Every soul has to reach its
perfection, has to be brought to its goal and destination — be it felicity
and happiness or infelicity and unhappiness. It is an issue, which cannot
be avoided, a proposition from which there is no escape.
Second: The good and the evil are
attributed to the "self" or "soul" of the persons, but at the same time
and in the same context they depend on the belief and the disbelief
respectively - and these two are within man's power and emanate from his
will and choice. This is among the finest Qur'anic realities which opens
the door to many secrets of monotheism. It may be understood from the
words of Allah: And every one has a direction to which he would
turn; therefore hasten to (do) good works (2:148), when read
in conjunction with the words: but that He might try you in what He gave
you, therefore strive with one another to hasten to virtuous deeds
(5:48). We shall write on this topic in full detail under the
verse: That Allah may separate the impure from the pure, and put the
impure, some of it upon the other, and pile it up together, then cast it
into hell (8:37).
Third: The belief in Allah and
His messengers is the essence of the goodness of life, i.e., goodness of
"person" or "soul". So far as reward is concerned it depends upon piety
and good deeds. That is why Allah has first mentioned the subject of
separating the good from the evil; then basing on that, has given the
order to believe in Allah and His messengers; thereafter when He wanted to
mention the reward, He added piety (guarding against evil) to the belief;
and said: "and if you believe and guard (against evil), then you
shall have a great reward ".
From the above, you may
easily understand the connotation of the verse 97 of chapter 16:
Whoever does good whether male or female and he is a believer, We will
most certainly make him live a happy life, and We will most certainly give
them their reward for the best of what they did. Evidently his happy
life is the result of his belief, and emanates from it; but the reward is
the result of the good deeds. Therefore, belief is the soul of the good
life. But its continuity - so that it may produce the desired effects -
requires good deeds. It is like the natural life which depends on a soul
for its coming into being but its continuity depends on the use of its
powers and organs - if all become still, all will die and life will
end.
The name, Allah, has been
repeated several (i.e. four) times in this verse. There was a possibility
of using pronouns in place of the latter three, but the proper Divine Name
was used so that it might clearly guide to the Source of all greatness and
beauty, because the verses were related to those affairs which are
exclusively reserved to Him in His divinity, that is, test of the
creatures, knowledge of the unseen, selection of the messengers and man's
ability to believe in Him.
QUR'AN: And let not those
deem, . . . and Allah is aware of what you do:
The preceding verse has
described how Allah gives respite to the unbelievers. The case of
niggardliness, of not spending the wealth in the way of Allah, is not
different from that; a niggardly person rejoices in, and boasts of, the
riches he has amassed. Therefore Allah now addresses them and shows that
what they are proud of, is actually worse for them. The wealth is
described as, "that which Allah has granted them out of His grace";
it shows how mean they are and how much they should be condemned. The
description, that the wealth, which they are so niggardly about, shall
become like iron collar around their necks, shows why their niggardliness
is worse for them. The clause, "and Allah's is the heritage of the
heavens and the earth", is apparently a circumstantial one related
to "the Resurrection Day", that is, on the Resurrection Day when to
Allah will belong the said heritage The same is the position of the last
clause, "and Allah is aware of what you do".
As a remote possibility, the
words, "and Allah's is the heritage..., may be treated as the
circumstantial clause of the verb, "are niggardly"; while the next
clause, "and Allah is aware of what you do", may have the same
position (i.e. circumstantial clause of, "are niggardly "), or may be
treated as an independent sentence.
TRADITIONS
al-Baqir (a.s.) was asked
about the unbeliever whether death was better for him or life. He said:
"Death is better for the believer and the unbeliever (both); because Allah
says, and that which is with Allah is best for the righteous
(3:198), and He (also) says: 'And let not those who disbelieve
think that Our granting them respite is good for their souls. . ."
(at-Tafsir, al-'Ayyashi)
The author
says: The
argument given in this tradition does not fully conform with the style of
the Imams of the Ahlu 'l-bayt (a.s.), because the word,
"righteous", refers to only a particular group of the believers, not to
all of them. Although it may be said that the word covers all the
believers because each of them has got some portion of righteousness in
him.
A tradition of the above
meaning has been narrated in ad-Durru 'I-manthur, from Ibn
Mas'ud.
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