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Sūrah 59 · Āyāt 1824

The verses

  1. 18

    يَٰٓأَيُّهَا ٱلَّذِينَ ءَامَنُوا۟ ٱتَّقُوا۟ ٱللَّهَ وَلْتَنظُرْ نَفْسٌۭ مَّا قَدَّمَتْ لِغَدٍۢ ۖ وَٱتَّقُوا۟ ٱللَّهَ ۚ إِنَّ ٱللَّهَ خَبِيرٌۢ بِمَا تَعْمَلُونَ

    O you who have faith! Be wary of Allah, and let every soul consider what it sends ahead for Tomorrow, and be wary of Allah. Allah is indeed well aware of what you do

  2. 19

    وَلَا تَكُونُوا۟ كَٱلَّذِينَ نَسُوا۟ ٱللَّهَ فَأَنسَىٰهُمْ أَنفُسَهُمْ ۚ أُو۟لَٰٓئِكَ هُمُ ٱلْفَٰسِقُونَ

    Do not be like those who forget Allah, so He makes them forget their own souls. It is they who are the transgressors.

  3. 20

    لَا يَسْتَوِىٓ أَصْحَٰبُ ٱلنَّارِ وَأَصْحَٰبُ ٱلْجَنَّةِ ۚ أَصْحَٰبُ ٱلْجَنَّةِ هُمُ ٱلْفَآئِزُونَ

    Not equal are the inmates of the Fire and the inhabitants of paradise. It is the inhabitants of paradise who are the successful ones.

  4. 21

    لَوْ أَنزَلْنَا هَٰذَا ٱلْقُرْءَانَ عَلَىٰ جَبَلٍۢ لَّرَأَيْتَهُۥ خَٰشِعًۭا مُّتَصَدِّعًۭا مِّنْ خَشْيَةِ ٱللَّهِ ۚ وَتِلْكَ ٱلْأَمْثَٰلُ نَضْرِبُهَا لِلنَّاسِ لَعَلَّهُمْ يَتَفَكَّرُونَ

    Had We sent down this Quran upon a mountain, you would have seen it humbled [and] go to pieces with the fear of Allah. We draw such comparisons for mankind, so that they may reflect.

  5. 22

    هُوَ ٱللَّهُ ٱلَّذِى لَآ إِلَٰهَ إِلَّا هُوَ ۖ عَٰلِمُ ٱلْغَيْبِ وَٱلشَّهَٰدَةِ ۖ هُوَ ٱلرَّحْمَٰنُ ٱلرَّحِيمُ

    He is Allah—there is no god except Him—Knower of the sensible and the Unseen, He is the All-beneficent, the All-merciful.

  6. 23

    هُوَ ٱللَّهُ ٱلَّذِى لَآ إِلَٰهَ إِلَّا هُوَ ٱلْمَلِكُ ٱلْقُدُّوسُ ٱلسَّلَٰمُ ٱلْمُؤْمِنُ ٱلْمُهَيْمِنُ ٱلْعَزِيزُ ٱلْجَبَّارُ ٱلْمُتَكَبِّرُ ۚ سُبْحَٰنَ ٱللَّهِ عَمَّا يُشْرِكُونَ

    He is Allah—there is no god except Him—the Sovereign, the All-holy, the All-benign, the Securer, the All-conserver, the All-mighty, the All-compeller, and the All-magnanimous. Clear is Allah of any partners that they may ascribe [to Him]!

  7. 24

    هُوَ ٱللَّهُ ٱلْخَٰلِقُ ٱلْبَارِئُ ٱلْمُصَوِّرُ ۖ لَهُ ٱلْأَسْمَآءُ ٱلْحُسْنَىٰ ۚ يُسَبِّحُ لَهُۥ مَا فِى ٱلسَّمَٰوَٰتِ وَٱلْأَرْضِ ۖ وَهُوَ ٱلْعَزِيزُ ٱلْحَكِيمُ

    He is Allah, the Creator, the Maker, and the Former. To Him belong the Best Names. Whatever there is in the heavens and the earth glorifies Him and He is the All-mighty, the All-wise.

English translation: Ali Quli Qarai

✦ Synthesisopus-4.8every claim cited to a source below

Al-Hashr 18-24 -- Taqwa, Self-Reckoning, and the Names of God

The sura's close draws the moral of everything before it. Banu al-Nadir and the hypocrites perished because, in al-Mizan's words, 'they did not heed God but forgot Him, so He made them forget themselves.' Against that, verses 18-19 command the believers: 'Fear God, and let every soul look to what it has sent ahead for the morrow... and be not like those who forgot God.'

Two kinds of taqwa. Al-Mizan reads the doubled 'fear God' as two distinct summons -- taqwa in performing deeds, and taqwa in scrutinizing them afterward (muhasaba, self-reckoning) -- and explicitly rejects the commoner view (which Tabarsi and Tusi also report) that the first is for past sins and the second for future. Tusi and Tabarsi gloss 'the morrow' as the Day of Resurrection, brought near. On v.19, al-Mizan develops its signature theme: forgetting God entails forgetting one's own nature as a wholly dependent servant; Bahrani preserves al-Rida's careful correction that God's 'forgetting' is never literal but a just requital. Verse 20 -- 'Not equal are the inmates of the Fire and the inhabitants of the Garden' -- al-Mizan turns into a proof that one must join the rememberers. Here Bahrani (and the Enlightening Commentary alike) preserve prophetic narrations glossing the Garden's people as those who accept 'Ali's walaya and the Fire's as those who fought him; this walaya reading, with its companion-polemical edge, is given as attributed and flagged for review.

The mountain and the Names. Verse 21 -- 'Had We sent down this Qur'an upon a mountain, you would have seen it humbled, rent asunder' -- is read by all as a parable magnifying the Qur'an as God's own speech; al-Mizan, Tabarsi and Tusi agree it is figurative ('such are the parables We strike'). The sura ends (vv.22-24) with the densest cluster of divine Names in the Qur'an. Tabarsi and al-Mizan itemize each -- al-Malik, al-Quddus, al-Salam, al-Mu'min, al-Muhaymin, al-'Aziz, al-Jabbar, al-Mutakabbir, then al-Khaliq, al-Bari', al-Musawwir -- and both preserve the tradition (Ibn 'Abbas via Sa'id b. Jubayr; and the recitation-merits from Anas, Ma'qil and Abu Hurayra) that the Greatest Name of God lies in these closing verses. Qummi and Bahrani add the theology of the Names: al-Sadiq's teaching (via Hisham) that true tawhid worships the Named, not the name, and Musa b. Ja'far's warning against those whose minds 'strayed' into likening God. (Web-verified: vv.22-24 do hold the highest concentration of divine Names in the Qur'an, and the last three verses' recitation-merit and 'greatest name' associations are widely transmitted.)

The tafsīr (6 sources)