يَٰٓأَيُّهَا ٱلَّذِينَ ءَامَنُوا۟ لَا يَسْخَرْ قَوْمٌۭ مِّن قَوْمٍ عَسَىٰٓ أَن يَكُونُوا۟ خَيْرًۭا مِّنْهُمْ وَلَا نِسَآءٌۭ مِّن نِّسَآءٍ عَسَىٰٓ أَن يَكُنَّ خَيْرًۭا مِّنْهُنَّ ۖ وَلَا تَلْمِزُوٓا۟ أَنفُسَكُمْ وَلَا تَنَابَزُوا۟ بِٱلْأَلْقَٰبِ ۖ بِئْسَ ٱلِٱسْمُ ٱلْفُسُوقُ بَعْدَ ٱلْإِيمَٰنِ ۚ وَمَن لَّمْ يَتُبْ فَأُو۟لَٰٓئِكَ هُمُ ٱلظَّٰلِمُونَ
O you who have faith! Let not any people ridicule another people: it may be that they are better than they are; nor let women [ridicule] women: it may be that they are better than they are. And do not defame one another, nor insult one another by [calling] nicknames. How evil are profane names subsequent to faith! As for those who are not penitent [of their past conduct]—such are the wrongdoers.
يَٰٓأَيُّهَا ٱلَّذِينَ ءَامَنُوا۟ ٱجْتَنِبُوا۟ كَثِيرًۭا مِّنَ ٱلظَّنِّ إِنَّ بَعْضَ ٱلظَّنِّ إِثْمٌۭ ۖ وَلَا تَجَسَّسُوا۟ وَلَا يَغْتَب بَّعْضُكُم بَعْضًا ۚ أَيُحِبُّ أَحَدُكُمْ أَن يَأْكُلَ لَحْمَ أَخِيهِ مَيْتًۭا فَكَرِهْتُمُوهُ ۚ وَٱتَّقُوا۟ ٱللَّهَ ۚ إِنَّ ٱللَّهَ تَوَّابٌۭ رَّحِيمٌۭ
O you who have faith! Avoid much suspicion; indeed some suspicions are sins. And do not spy on one another or backbite. Will any of you love to eat the flesh of his dead brother? You would hate it. Be wary of Allah; indeed Allah is all-clement, all-merciful.
يَٰٓأَيُّهَا ٱلنَّاسُ إِنَّا خَلَقْنَٰكُم مِّن ذَكَرٍۢ وَأُنثَىٰ وَجَعَلْنَٰكُمْ شُعُوبًۭا وَقَبَآئِلَ لِتَعَارَفُوٓا۟ ۚ إِنَّ أَكْرَمَكُمْ عِندَ ٱللَّهِ أَتْقَىٰكُمْ ۚ إِنَّ ٱللَّهَ عَلِيمٌ خَبِيرٌۭ
O mankind! Indeed, We created you from a male and a female, and made you nations and tribes that you may identify yourselves with one another. Indeed the noblest of you in the sight of Allah is the most Godwary among you. Indeed Allah is all-knowing, all-aware.
English translation: Ali Quli Qarai
Having enjoined reconciliation, the sūra turns to the vices that fracture the brotherhood: mockery, defamation, insulting nicknames (v.11), suspicion, spying and backbiting (v.12), culminating in the charter of human equality (v.13). The commentators treat the first two verses as a lexicon of social sin and the third as its foundation.
Mockery, nicknames, and the ‘one soul.’ Ṭabarsī and Ṭūsī define the terms (hamz, lamz, nabz, ghība) and, with al-Mīzān, read ‘nor defame yourselves’ as showing that the believers are one body, so to belittle another is to belittle oneself — ‘perhaps they are better than them’ being the reason for the ban. On the occasions the sources overlap and are given as attributed: al-Qummī and al-Burhān place ‘let no women deride women’ over the taunting of Ṣafiyya bint Ḥuyayy as ‘daughter of a Jew’ (the Prophet teaching her the retort ‘my father is Aaron, my uncle Moses, my husband Muḥammad’); Ṭabarsī adds the same tradition alongside the story of Thābit b. Qays. The Enlightening Commentary and al-Burhān also recall the Banū Tamīm who mocked poor Companions — ʿAmmār, Bilāl, Salmān, Ṣuhayb — ‘outwardly poor, inwardly better than the deriders.’
Suspicion, spying, backbiting. All the sources gloss ‘avoid much suspicion’ as ill suspicion, forbidden when acted upon; Ṭūsī and al-Mīzān stress that the bare thought is involuntary while its consequences are the sin. On backbiting, Ṭabarsī and Ṭūsī unfold the parable of eating the dead brother’s flesh, and al-Mīzān supplies a memorable social diagnosis — ghība as a disease that consumes the body of society limb by limb, tearing the veil God cast over people’s faults. Al-Burhān gathers a dense chapter of Kāfī traditions (accusation dissolving faith ‘as salt in water,’ the concealing of seventy faults, backbiting ‘quicker than gangrene’), and the Enlightening Commentary a long series to the same effect, including the distinction of ghība from slander and the exception for the one who flaunts his sin openly.
‘The noblest of you is the most God-fearing.’ On v.13 the commentators are united: lineage is levelled — all descend from Ādam and Ḥawwāʾ — and difference of peoples and tribes serves only mutual acquaintance, not pride. Al-Qummī and Ṭabarsī report the gloss (from al-Ṣādiq) that shuʿūb are the non-Arabs and qabāʾil the Arabs, and al-Qummī cites the Prophet’s conquest-day sermon abolishing ‘the arrogance of the Jāhiliyya.’ Al-Mīzān draws out the philosophy: the only real and uncontested honor is nearness to God through taqwā. Al-Burhān adds the Salmān tradition (‘a man’s lineage is his religion, his root his intellect’) and al-Riḍā’s insistence that ‘piety is their nobility’ and this verse is unabrogated; its ‘God apportioned creation’ narrations, placing the Prophet’s House in the best portion and (in one version) naming the Mahdī from Fāṭima’s progeny, are rendered here as they are attributed. The Enlightening Commentary rounds the passage with an extended meditation on taqwā as ‘the best provision’ and the fruit of the tree of faith.