-->
The will then have passed through the fire of Judgment and will now be in the fire of Punishment. The Reality will not only now be clear to them, but after the questionings of the angels they cannot even pretend to make any excuses. They will freely confess, but that is not repentance, for repentance implies amendment, and the time for repentance and amendment will have long been past.
No translation has been selected yet. Please click on the (Compare) link at the top and enable the translations of your choice.
For this rendering of the expression bi'l-ghayb, see surah {2}, note [3].
This can also mean that they are in awe of their Lord as much in private as they are in public.
See n. 3902 to xxxv. 18. Read "unseen" adverbially. To fear the Lord is to love Him so intensely that you fear to do anything which is against His Will, and you do it because you realise Him intensely in your hearts, though you do not see Him with your bodily senses. Nor is it of any consequences whether other people see your love or the consequences that flow from your love, for your good deeds are for the love of Allah and not for show in the eyes of men. Such intensity of love obtains forgiveness for any past, and is indeed rewarded with Allah's love, which is immeasurably precious beyond any merits you may possess.
No translation has been selected yet. Please click on the (Compare) link at the top and enable the translations of your choice.
While the primary significance of the noun qawl is "a saying" or "an utterance", it is often used tropically in the sense of "a statement", i.e., of a belief, an opinion, a teaching, a doctrine, etc. In the present context it evidently relates to man's beliefs in general, be they affirmative or negative: hence the plural form in my rendering of this term.
I.e., He knows why one person believes in Him and another rejects this belief; hence, He takes man's innermost motivations, abilities and inabilities fully into account.
No translation has been selected yet. Please click on the (Compare) link at the top and enable the translations of your choice.
Lit., "Does He not know, [He] who has created?"
See surah {6}, note [89].
He Who creates must necessarily know His own handiwork. But lest we should measure His knowledge by such imperfect knowledge as we possess. His knowledge is further characterised as understanding the finest mysteries and being well acquainted with them (Latif and Khabir): see xxii. 63. n. 2844.
No translation has been selected yet. Please click on the (Compare) link at the top and enable the translations of your choice.
Lit., "who has made the earth submissive (dhalulan) to you": i.e., yielding to the intelligence with which He has endowed man.
Zalal is used in ii. 71 for an animal trained and tractable: here it is used to qualify the earth, and I have translated 'manageable'. Man has managed to make paths through deserts and over mountains: through rivers and seas by means of ships; through the air by means of airways; he has made bridges and tunnels and other means of communication. But this he has only been able to do because Allah has given him the necessary intelligence and has made the earth tractable to that intelligence.
In describing Allah's gifts and mercies and watchful care in this our temporary sojourn on this earth, it is made clear that the ultimate end is the Hereafter. The real Beyond, which is the goal, is the life after the Resurrection.
No translation has been selected yet. Please click on the (Compare) link at the top and enable the translations of your choice.
This expression is, of course, purely metaphorical since God is limitless in space as well as in time. Its use here is apparently meant to stress the unfathomable quality of His existence and power, which penetrates, and reveals itself in, every aspect of His cosmic creativeness, symbolized in the term "heaven".
Cf. xvii. 68. and n. 2263. Also cf. the story of Qarun in xxviii. 76-82. If we feel safe on land, it is because Allah has made this earth amenable, manageable and serviceable to us (verse 15 above). But if we defy Allah and break His Law, have we any security, that even this comparatively unimportant safety in a fleeting world will last? Looking at it from a purely physical point of view, have there not been dreadful earthquakes, typhoons, and tornadoes?
No translation has been selected yet. Please click on the (Compare) link at the top and enable the translations of your choice.
Lit., "a stormwind that raises stones".
Cf. xvii. 68; and xxix. 40, n. 3462. Such a violent wind destroyed the wicked Cities which defied Lut's warning.
No translation has been selected yet. Please click on the (Compare) link at the top and enable the translations of your choice.
Lit., "before them" (min qablihim). This personal pronoun relates - as does the whole of the passage beginning with verse {13} - to people of all times, who are herewith reminded of what happened to deniers of the truth in earlier times; hence my rendering of min qablihim as "aforetime".
Cf. xxii. 42-44, and n. 2822.
No translation has been selected yet. Please click on the (Compare) link at the top and enable the translations of your choice.
The flight of birds is one of the most beautiful and wonderful things in nature. The make and arrangement of their feathers and bones, and their stream-line shapes, from beak to tail, are instances of purposive adaptation. They soar with outstretched wings; they dart about with folded wings; their motions upwards and downwards, as well as their stabilisation in the air, and when they rest on their feet, have given many ideas to man in the science and art of aeronautics. But who taught or gave to birds this wonderful adaptation? None but Allah, Whose infinite Mercy provides for every creature just those conditions which are best adapted for its life.
In the Arabic, there is an artistic touch which it is not possible to reproduce in the translation. Saffat (spreading their wings) is in the form of the active participle, suggesting the continuous soaring on outspread wings; while yaqbidhna (folding them in) is in the Aorist form, suggesting the spasmodic flapping of wings.
No translation has been selected yet. Please click on the (Compare) link at the top and enable the translations of your choice.
Lit., "an army".
Not the greatest army that man can muster is of any use against the Wrath of Allah; while the constant watchful care of Allah is all-in-all to us, and we can never do without it. If the godless wander about in search for blessings otherwise than in the Mercy and Grace of Allah, they are wandering in vain delusions.
No translation has been selected yet. Please click on the (Compare) link at the top and enable the translations of your choice.
"Sustenance" here, as elsewhere, (e.g., in xvi. 73, n. 2105), refers to all that is necessary to sustain and develop life in all its phases. Allah Most Gracious is the Source of all our Sustenance, and if we persist in looking to Vanities for our Sustenance, we are pursuing a mirage, and, if we examine the matter, we are only following obstinate unpulses of rebellion and impiety.
No translation has been selected yet. Please click on the (Compare) link at the top and enable the translations of your choice.
Cf. xxvii. 90, and n. 3320. The man of probity is the man who walks evenly on a Straight Way, his feet guided by Allah's Light and his heart sustained by Allah's Mercy. The man who chooses evil grovels, with his face down, in paths of Darkness, stumbling on the way, and in constant distrust and fear, the fear of Evil. The two kinds of men are poles apart, although they five on the same earth, see the same Signs, and are fed with the same Mercies from Allah.
Like Abraham trying to guide his unbelieving father: Cf. xix. 43.
No translation has been selected yet. Please click on the (Compare) link at the top and enable the translations of your choice.
I.e., with the faculty of feeling as well as of rational thinking.
The Prophet is asked to draw constant attention to Allah, the source of all growth and development, the Giver of the faculties by which we can judge and attain to higher and higher spiritual dignity. And yet, such is our self-will, we use our faculties for wrong purposes and thus show our ingratitude to Allah.
For anshaa see n. 923 to vi. 98.
No translation has been selected yet. Please click on the (Compare) link at the top and enable the translations of your choice.
Mankind, from one set of parents, has been multiplied and scattered through the earth. Men have not only multiplied in numbers but they have developed different languages and characteristics, inner and outer. But they will all be gathered together at the End of Things, when the mischief created by the wrong exercise of man's will be cancelled, and the Truth of Allah will reign universally.
No translation has been selected yet. Please click on the (Compare) link at the top and enable the translations of your choice.
The Unbelievers are sceptical, but they are answered in the next two verses.
No translation has been selected yet. Please click on the (Compare) link at the top and enable the translations of your choice.