ROOT ه ط ع

Important Words:

مھطعین (hurrying on in fright) is derived from اھطع which is derived from ھطع. They say ھطع الرجل i.e. the man came running in fright; or the man advanced with his eyes fixed on something from which he did not raise them. اھطع البعیر means, the camel stretched forth its neck and lowered its head. اھطع الرجل also means, the man looked with humility and humbleness (Aqrab).

مقنعی (raising up) is derived from اقنع which is derived from قنع. They say قنع الجبل i.e. he mounted the hill. اقنع رأسه means, he raised up his head and fixed it straight, turning neither to the right nor to the left (Aqrab). ھواء (utterly void) is derived from ھوی which means, it fell from a high level to a low level; or contrarily, it rose and went up. الھواء means, the firmament; an empty thing; a void; coward, because his heart is, as it were, empty, having no courage (Aqrab).

Commentary:

What a graphic picture of the Fall of Mecca! The great prophecy of the final triumph of the Holy Prophet and the utter discomfiture of his enemies was wonderfully fulfilled by the Fall of Mecca when the Sacred House of God passed into the hands of the Muslims for all time. This verse gives a graphic description of the bewilderment and consternation of the Meccans when they suddenly found the Holy Prophet at the very gates of Mecca with an army ten thousand strong, without their having the least inkling of his coming. For proof of the fact that the eyes of the Meccans became actually fixed in a stare and their minds were literally void and they ran about in fright with their heads raised in bewilderment, one has only to turn to any book of history about the Fall of Mecca.

36:52; 14:44.

Important Words:

مھطعین (hastening) is the plural of مھطع which is act. part. from أھطع which is transitive form of ھطع. They say ھطع الرجل i.e. the man came running in fright; or the man advanced with his eyes fixed on something from which he did not raise them. أھطع فی السیر means, he hastened and came in haste frightened. أھطع الرجل also means, the man looked with humility. مھطع means, one who looks at a thing without raising his eyes from it (Aqrab). See also 14:44.

Commentary:

This and the preceding two verses give a graphic picture of the confusion, consternation and bewilderment of the Quraish when they saw the Summoner—the Holy Prophet—whom they had driven out of Mecca and upon whose head they had set a price only a few years earlier, at the very gates of the city. The mighty prophecy embodied in these verses was made at a time when the fate of Islam itself was hanging in the balance and, humanly speaking, there was not the remotest possibility of its being fulfilled.

14:43-44.