وَلَقَدْ ءَاتَيْنَا لُقْمَٰنَ ٱلْحِكْمَةَ أَنِ ٱشْكُرْ لِلَّهِ ۚ وَمَن يَشْكُرْ فَإِنَّمَا يَشْكُرُ لِنَفْسِهِۦ ۖ وَمَن كَفَرَ فَإِنَّ ٱللَّهَ غَنِىٌّ حَمِيدٌۭ
Certainly We gave Luqman wisdom, saying, ‘Give thanks to Allah; and whoever gives thanks, gives thanks only for his own sake. And whoever is ungrateful, [let him know that] Allah is indeed all-sufficient, all-laudable.’
وَإِذْ قَالَ لُقْمَٰنُ لِٱبْنِهِۦ وَهُوَ يَعِظُهُۥ يَٰبُنَىَّ لَا تُشْرِكْ بِٱللَّهِ ۖ إِنَّ ٱلشِّرْكَ لَظُلْمٌ عَظِيمٌۭ
When Luqman said to his son, as he advised him: ‘O my son! Do not ascribe any partners to Allah. Polytheism is indeed a great injustice.’
وَوَصَّيْنَا ٱلْإِنسَٰنَ بِوَٰلِدَيْهِ حَمَلَتْهُ أُمُّهُۥ وَهْنًا عَلَىٰ وَهْنٍۢ وَفِصَٰلُهُۥ فِى عَامَيْنِ أَنِ ٱشْكُرْ لِى وَلِوَٰلِدَيْكَ إِلَىَّ ٱلْمَصِيرُ
We have enjoined man concerning his parents: His mother carried him through weakness upon weakness, and his weaning takes two years. Give thanks to Me and to your parents. To Me is the return.
وَإِن جَٰهَدَاكَ عَلَىٰٓ أَن تُشْرِكَ بِى مَا لَيْسَ لَكَ بِهِۦ عِلْمٌۭ فَلَا تُطِعْهُمَا ۖ وَصَاحِبْهُمَا فِى ٱلدُّنْيَا مَعْرُوفًۭا ۖ وَٱتَّبِعْ سَبِيلَ مَنْ أَنَابَ إِلَىَّ ۚ ثُمَّ إِلَىَّ مَرْجِعُكُمْ فَأُنَبِّئُكُم بِمَا كُنتُمْ تَعْمَلُونَ
But if they urge you to ascribe to Me as partner that of which you have no knowledge, then do not obey them. Keep their company honourably in this world and follow the way of those who turn to Me penitently. Then to Me will be your return, whereat I will inform you concerning what you used to do.
يَٰبُنَىَّ إِنَّهَآ إِن تَكُ مِثْقَالَ حَبَّةٍۢ مِّنْ خَرْدَلٍۢ فَتَكُن فِى صَخْرَةٍ أَوْ فِى ٱلسَّمَٰوَٰتِ أَوْ فِى ٱلْأَرْضِ يَأْتِ بِهَا ٱللَّهُ ۚ إِنَّ ٱللَّهَ لَطِيفٌ خَبِيرٌۭ
‘O my son! Even if it should be the weight of a mustard seed, and [even though] it should be in a rock, or in the heavens, or in the earth, Allah will produce it. Indeed Allah is all-attentive, all-aware.
يَٰبُنَىَّ أَقِمِ ٱلصَّلَوٰةَ وَأْمُرْ بِٱلْمَعْرُوفِ وَٱنْهَ عَنِ ٱلْمُنكَرِ وَٱصْبِرْ عَلَىٰ مَآ أَصَابَكَ ۖ إِنَّ ذَٰلِكَ مِنْ عَزْمِ ٱلْأُمُورِ
O my son! Maintain the prayer and bid what is right and forbid what is wrong, and be patient through whatever may befall you. That is indeed the steadiest of courses.
وَلَا تُصَعِّرْ خَدَّكَ لِلنَّاسِ وَلَا تَمْشِ فِى ٱلْأَرْضِ مَرَحًا ۖ إِنَّ ٱللَّهَ لَا يُحِبُّ كُلَّ مُخْتَالٍۢ فَخُورٍۢ
Do not turn your cheek away disdainfully from the people, and do not walk exultantly on the earth. Indeed Allah does not like any swaggering braggart.
وَٱقْصِدْ فِى مَشْيِكَ وَٱغْضُضْ مِن صَوْتِكَ ۚ إِنَّ أَنكَرَ ٱلْأَصْوَٰتِ لَصَوْتُ ٱلْحَمِيرِ
Be modest in your bearing, and lower your voice. Indeed the ungainliest of voices is the donkey’s voice.’
English translation: Ali Quli Qarai
After the opening contrast between the Book's guidance and the one who "buys idle talk," the surah turns to its namesake. al-Ṭabāṭabāʾī (al-Mīzān) frames the placement precisely: Luqmān's story, "brimming with wisdom and admonition," stands opposite the account of the mocker who misleads "without knowledge." Luqmān is named in the Qurʾān only here.
What the passage says. God gave Luqmān ḥikma and bid him give thanks (v.12); Luqmān warns his son against shirk as "a great wrong" (v.13); a parenthesis enjoins gratitude to parents — the mother who "carried him in weakness upon weakness" — while forbidding obedience to them in shirk (vv.14–15); then Luqmān resumes: nothing escapes God's reckoning, even a mustard-seed's weight (v.16); establish prayer, enjoin good, forbid evil, be patient (v.17); shun arrogance in face and gait, and moderate your walk and voice (vv.18–19).
Wisdom, and was Luqmān a prophet? al-Ṭabāṭabāʾī defines ḥikma as "beneficial knowledge, the balanced mean between ignorance and over-cleverness (jarbaza)," and reads the very gift of wisdom as itself a summons to gratitude. al-Ṭabarsī and al-Ṭūsī report the standard split — Ibn ʿAbbās, Mujāhid and Qatāda hold he was a wise man, not a prophet; ʿIkrima, al-Suddī and al-Shaʿbī, that he was a prophet (a split confirmed in the wider tradition). Both relate the Ibn ʿUmar hadith: Luqmān was "a servant much given to reflection" whom God offered the vicegerency, and who chose well-being (ʿāfiya) over the trial of judging. The Imāmī narrators sharpen the gift: al-Qummī and al-Baḥrānī transmit al-Ṣādiq's "knowledge of the Imām of his age," while al-Baḥrānī also records Mūsā b. Jaʿfar's terse "understanding and intellect."
The rights of parents. On "weakness upon weakness," al-Ṭabarsī and al-Ṭūsī gather the lexical range — weakness upon weakness, or hardship upon hardship (Ibn ʿAbbās), or the child's successive frailty. al-Ṭabāṭabāʾī notes the verse is an iʿtirāḍ (a parenthesis in God's voice, not Luqmān's), and famously joins "his weaning is in two years" to 46:15 to derive a minimum pregnancy of six months. He anchors the duty in al-Sajjād's Risālat al-Ḥuqūq and the hadith "your mother" (thrice) "then your father," yet bounds it by the rule — voiced through al-Ḥusayn's retort to Ibn ʿAmr b. al-ʿĀṣ — that "there is no obedience to a creature in disobedience to the Creator." al-Baḥrānī adds the distinctive Imāmī taʾwīl that the "two parents" owed thanks are, inwardly, the Prophet and ʿAlī — explicitly without cancelling the duty to one's physical parents, whose "right only increased in gravity."
The mustard seed and the manners. For v.16, al-Ṭabarsī, al-Ṭūsī and al-Ṭabāṭabāʾī read it of deeds: the tiniest act, hidden in rock or heaven or earth, God will bring for reckoning, for He is Laṭīf (His knowledge "penetrates the depths of things") and Khabīr; al-Ṭabarsī and al-Baḥrānī attach al-Ṣādiq's "beware the belittled sins, for they have a seeker." al-Qummī (echoed by al-Baḥrānī) preserves a minority reading — "it is of the rizq God will bring you." On vv.17–19, al-Ṭabāṭabāʾī argues the demonstrative "that is of the matters of resolve" points specifically to patience (per 42:43, 3:186), and glosses ṣaʿar (a camel's neck-twisting disease) and maraḥ via al-Rāghib; al-Ṭabarsī, al-Ṭūsī and al-Qummī concur that the verses forbid arrogance of face and gait and command a moderate walk and lowered voice. On "the most disagreeable of voices," al-Baḥrānī and al-Ṭabāṭabāʾī cite al-Ṣādiq's gloss "the loud, ugly outburst… unless one is calling [to God] or reciting the Qurʾān," while al-Baḥrānī also records al-Bursī's polemical taʾwīl of the braying donkeys. The Enlightening Commentary gathers these into its practical ethic: gratitude, the gravity of shirk, devotion to parents within the limits of faith, God-consciousness of the smallest deed, and the dignity of humility in bearing and speech.