The exact period of its revelation is not known from any reliable tradition. It appears to be the early Makkan period when persecution had not yet become tyrannical and the Islamic movement was being suppressed only by ridicule, rumor mongering, false allegations and casting of evil suggestions in the people's minds.
- The Day of Resurrection is sure to come for Allah's Judgement to reward the believers and punish the disbelievers.
- Those who do not believe in the hereafter are doomed.
- The mountains and birds used to sing Allah's praises with the Prophet Dawood.
- Allah subjected the winds and Jinns to the Prophet Sulaiman.
- Intercession before Allah can not avail anyone except for whom He permits.
- Muhammad (pbuh) is sent as a Rasool for the whole of mankind.
- Wealth and children are a test to whom they are given.
- Whatever you spend in charity, Allah will pay you back in full.
- The truth has come, falsehood neither originates nor restores anything.
- On the Day of Judgement disbelievers will wish that they were believers.
This Surah deals with those objections of the disbelievers which they were raising against the Prophet's message of Tawhid and the Hereafter, and about his Prophethood, mostly in the form of allegations, taunts and mockery. These objections have been answered in the form of instructions, admonition and warning about the evil consequences of their stubbornness. The stories of the Sabians and the Prophets David and Solomon have been cited as to say: "You have both these historical precedents before you. On the one hand, there were the Prophets David and Solomon, who had been blessed by Allah with great powers and such grandeur and glory as had been granted to hardly any one of the like before them. In spite of this, they were not proud and arrogant, but remained grateful servants of their Rabb. On the other hand, were the people of Saba, who, when blessed by Allah, became proud, and were consequently so thoroughly destroyed and dispersed that they were remembered only in myths and legends. With these precedents in view, you may see and judge for yourselves as to which type of life is better: the one which is built on belief in Tawhid, the Hereafter and the attitude of gratefulness to Allah, or the one which is based on disbelief, shirk, denial of the Hereafter and the worship of materialism."