ص

See1:1.

Commentary:

See. 1:1.

43:45.

Commentary:

The letter ص may signify "the Truthful God" or "I am Allah, the Truthful" or "God has spoken the truth" (صدق الله). For an explanation of abbreviated letters see 2:2 & 19:2.

ذی الذکر means full of admonition and exhortation or possessing eminence and honour; or acting upon its teaching the believers will achieve honour, good name and eminence.

The whole verse may mean that the Truthful God swears by the Quran that the followers of the Holy Prophet, by acting upon the teaching of the Quran and making it a rule of their lives, will achieve eminence and will come to occupy a most honoured place in the comity of nations. The verse thus constitutes a great prophecy about the glorious future of Islam.

Commentary:

The root-cause of all sin and disbelief is false pride, conceit and arrogance. The first recorded sin was committed by Satan who refused to submit to Adam on the basis of his farcical superiority to him (Adam).

انا خیر منه i.e. "I am better than he" (17:13) has always been the boast of disbelievers which has prevented them from accepting the truth in the time of every Prophet. They cannot persuade themselves to give their allegiance to one who, they say, is quite like themselves; even inferior to them in some respects.

6:7; 19:75; 36:32; 50:37.

Important Words:

لات (it was no longer). لاته عن کذا means, he withheld him or restrained him and turned him from such a course. لات شیئا means, he concealed a thing that he knew, and told or narrated something different from it. لاته حقه means, he diminished unto him his due or right. According to some scholars لات is originally لیس, its س being changed into ت and ی into الف; others are of the opinion that it is made up of two words, the fem. ت is added to the negative لا to make the word feminine or to render the negation more intensive. According to a third school, it is an independent word, neither originally لیس nor لا. The fourth school, however, thinks that it is a word and also a part of a word, namely the negative لا, and ت prefixed to حین.It is generally accompanied with حین or some word synonymous with it and is used as لات الحین حین مناص i.e. the time was not the time of refuge. The expression لات حین مناص may have the following different meanings:

1. There was no place of flight existing for them.

2. The time is, and was, not a time of flight.

3. The time of fleeing or petitioning or being aided will not be available to them.

لات was also one of three great idols of the Meccans, the other two being عزی and مناة (Lane, Aqrab & Zamakhshari).

مناص (time for escape) is derived from ناص. They say ناص عن قرینه i.e. he fled from, kept away from or left, his associate. ناص فلانا means, he missed such a one and went ahead of him. They say مالک من مناص i.e. there is no time or place of refuge for thee (Aqrab).

Commentary:

The verse means to say that disbelievers have rejected the message of truth with contempt and disdain, and consider it below their dignity to listen to the Holy Prophet, but when Divine punishment overtook them, they will cry for help but will find no refuge or asylum.

7:64.

Commentary:

The greatest obstacle in the way of disbelievers to accept the truth has always been that they would not pledge their allegiance to a man who is just one of them.

71:24.

Commentary:

As disbelievers believed that there were many gods, and the Holy Prophet proclaimed the Unity of God, they would say that somehow he had rolled all the gods into one.

The words "This is a thing designed" put in the mouths of the leaders of disbelief signify that according to them the Holy Prophet had his own ulterior motives to serve in preaching the message of the Unity of God. Or the words may mean that when invited by the Holy Prophet to give up idolatry, the leaders of the Quraish said to one another that they should stick to their own gods and that was a most desirable thing for them to do.

23:25.

Important Words:

اختلاق (fabrication) is derived from خلق which among other things means, he forged or fabricated a story or a lie, etc. (Lane). See also 3:50 & 26:138.

Commentary:

The words "the latest religion" may refer to Christianity or the idolatrous Faith of the pagans of Mecca, or they may refer to all religions preceding Islam, because in no religion before Islam had belief in the Unity of God remained pure and unadulterated.

54:26.

Commentary:

The verse refers to a great obstacle which stands in the way of disbelievers to accept the truth. They simply cannot, they say, persuade themselves to follow the lead of a man just like themselves—rather inferior to them in certain respects. The same subject has been referred to in 43:32 where the Meccan infidels are described as refusing to accept the Message of the Quran on the pretext, "why has not this Quran been sent to some great man of the two towns."

17:101; 52:38.

Commentary:

In reply to the refusal of disbelievers to accept the Holy Prophet on the plea that he was a mere mortal like them and nothing more, the verse reproachfully asks them: Since when have they arrogated to themselves the possession of the treasures of Divine mercy? It is God’s own special prerogative to select, in His infallible wisdom, whom He deems fit to be the bearer of His Message and the conveyer of His will to His creatures.

Commentary:

The present verse continues the argument embodied in the preceding verse and purports to say that disbelievers pose as if the kingdom of the heavens and the earth belongs to them. Then let them gather, it says, all their means and resources against the Holy Prophet and multiply them as much as they can and use them against him. They will find to their mortification that they cannot arrest or impede the progress of the new Message.

54:46.

Important Words:

مھزوم (routed) is derived from ھزم. They say ھزم العدو i.e. he broke and defeated the enemy. ھزم البشر means, he dug the well. ھزم فلاناً means, he killed him. جند مھزوم means, a defeated and broken army (Aqrab).

Commentary:

The verse at once contains a prophecy and a challenge. The challenge is to the forces of evil to muster all their resources and form themselves into a strong confederacy to stop the onward march of Islam. And the prophecy is to the effect that the combined forces of disbelief shall be put to an ignominious rout if they dared oppose Islam. This mighty prophecy was literally fulfilled in the Battle of the Ditch.

9:70; 40:32; 50:13.

Important Words:

اوتاد (stakes) is the plural of وتد. They say وتد الوتد i.e. he made the peg firm or he drove it into the hole. اوتاد means, tent-pegs, poles, wooden nails; stakes etc. اوتاد الارض signifies, the mountains; اوتاد البلاد means, the chief men of the towns and اوتاد الفم means, the teeth (Aqrab). ذو الاوتاد thus signifies, lord of large armies or stakes or of firmly established dominions.

15:79; 26:177; 50:15.

Commentary:

According to the Quran, اصحاب الایکة (Dwellers of the Wood) and اصحاب مدین (People of Median) are names of the same people, or rather, of two sections of the same people, who had adopted two different kinds of trade, one living on commerce and the other keeping herds of camels and sheep and selling milk, wood, etc. Thus, اصحاب الایکة is a section of the tribe of the Prophet Shu‘aib (26:177, 178), who has also been mentioned as having been sent to the People of Median (7:86, 11:85 & 29:37).

15:80; 26:190; 50:15.

Commentary:

The Meccan disbelievers are here warned that people wealthier and much stronger than they had lived before them. They rejected and opposed their Prophets with the result that they were destroyed. If they (the Meccans) opposed the Holy Prophet they also will meet a similar fate.

36:50.

Important Words:

فواق (delaying) is derived from فاق. They say فاقت الناقة i.e. the she-camel had in her udder the milk that had collected between two milkings. فواق means, the time between two milkings; the time between two suckings; the returning of the milk into the udder of the she-camel after the milking; the time between the opening of one’s hand and the grasping with it the udder of the she-camel; or when the milker grasps the udder and then lets it go in milking. They say ما أقام عندہ الافواقاً i.e. he did not stay with him but as long as between two milkings of a she-camel i.e. for a very short time (Lane).

Commentary:

The verse means to say that the whole attitude of disbelievers shows that they will not accept the truth till Divine punishment overtakes them, but when it comes, it would be swift and sudden and they would be granted no respite or delay.

2:201; 17:19.

Important Words:

قطنا (our portion) is derived from قط (qatta). They say قطه i.e. he cut it. قط القلم means, he nibbed the reed for writing. قطmeans, a slice cut off, a portion, share or lot, an hour or a portion of the night. مضی قط من اللیل means, a portion of the night passed (Lane & Aqrab).

Commentary:

The verse means to say that when disbelievers are warned that if they do not accept the Holy Prophet they will be punished, they turn the warning into an occasion for mocking the Prophet, and jeeringly say, "We demand to have the punishment here and now, and want no more respite." The use of the words "Day of Reckoning" implies that disbelievers will get the punishment when the reckoning of their evil deeds will have been made and they are shown to have fully deserved it.

Commentary:

In this and the following several verses the Holy Prophet has been enjoined to bear patiently the jeers and sneers of disbelievers, like Prophets David, Solomon and Job who too had to face mockery and opposition from their enemies. These three Prophets possessed great power, influence and wealth and that is why perhaps they have always been mentioned together in the Quran.

See also 4:164, 6:85 & 21:80-84.

21:80; 34:11.

Commentary:

For a detailed explanation of this and the next verse see 21:80 & 34:11.