وَإِذَا قِيلَ لَهُمْ تَعَالَوْا۟ يَسْتَغْفِرْ لَكُمْ رَسُولُ ٱللَّهِ لَوَّوْا۟ رُءُوسَهُمْ وَرَأَيْتَهُمْ يَصُدُّونَ وَهُم مُّسْتَكْبِرُونَ
When they are told, ‘Come, that Allah’s Apostle may plead for forgiveness for you,’ they twist their heads, and you see them turn away disdainfully.
سَوَآءٌ عَلَيْهِمْ أَسْتَغْفَرْتَ لَهُمْ أَمْ لَمْ تَسْتَغْفِرْ لَهُمْ لَن يَغْفِرَ ٱللَّهُ لَهُمْ ۚ إِنَّ ٱللَّهَ لَا يَهْدِى ٱلْقَوْمَ ٱلْفَٰسِقِينَ
It is the same for them whether you plead for forgiveness for them, or do not plead for forgiveness for them: Allah will never forgive them. Indeed Allah does not guide the transgressing lot.
هُمُ ٱلَّذِينَ يَقُولُونَ لَا تُنفِقُوا۟ عَلَىٰ مَنْ عِندَ رَسُولِ ٱللَّهِ حَتَّىٰ يَنفَضُّوا۟ ۗ وَلِلَّهِ خَزَآئِنُ ٱلسَّمَٰوَٰتِ وَٱلْأَرْضِ وَلَٰكِنَّ ٱلْمُنَٰفِقِينَ لَا يَفْقَهُونَ
They are the ones who say, ‘Do not spend on those who are with the Apostle of Allah until they scatter off [from around him].’ Yet to Allah belong the treasuries of the heavens and the earth, but the hypocrites do not understand.
يَقُولُونَ لَئِن رَّجَعْنَآ إِلَى ٱلْمَدِينَةِ لَيُخْرِجَنَّ ٱلْأَعَزُّ مِنْهَا ٱلْأَذَلَّ ۚ وَلِلَّهِ ٱلْعِزَّةُ وَلِرَسُولِهِۦ وَلِلْمُؤْمِنِينَ وَلَٰكِنَّ ٱلْمُنَٰفِقِينَ لَا يَعْلَمُونَ
They say, ‘When we return to the city, the mighty will surely expel the weak from it.’ Yet all might belongs to Allah and His Apostle and the faithful, but the hypocrites do not know.
English translation: Ali Quli Qarai
This central block moves from the hypocrites' contempt for the Prophet's intercession (vv.5-6) to the two seditious sayings that gave the sura its occasion (vv.7-8). On the twisting of heads, al-Tabarsi and al-Tusi agree it is mockery and prideful aversion when they are invited so the Messenger might seek their pardon; al-Mizan locates it 'after some of their treachery had shown.' On v.6 all four exegetes read the equivalence 'whether you ask or not' as meaning the Prophet's pardon simply cannot benefit them: al-Mizan explains that to forgive them would be to guide them, and God does not guide those who have stepped outside servitude; al-Tabarsi and al-Tusi both cite al-Hasan al-Basri that God had informed the Prophet they would die in disbelief, so he ceased interceding. Al-Bahrani sharpens this with a tradition from Imam al-Rida: the Prophet, undeterred by 9:80 ('though you ask seventy times'), asked forgiveness a hundred times, until this verse and 9:84 closed the door -- after which he never again prayed over a hypocrite's grave.
On v.7's boycott ('do not spend... until they scatter'), the sources are united that the treasuries of the heavens and earth are God's, so the believers' provision does not depend on the hypocrites: al-Tusi stresses it cannot harm the Prophet, al-Tabarsi and al-Mizan that God tests the poor believers with patience for a noble reward. The Enlightening Commentary extends the boycott motif to later history -- Mu'awiya's exclusion of 'Ali's partisans from the treasury and the denial of water to al-Husayn at Karbala', and modern sanctions -- an application presented as the commentary's own.
Verse 8's boast, 'the mightier will expel the meaner,' every source attributes to 'Abd Allah ibn Ubayy, who meant himself by 'the mightier' and the Prophet by 'the meaner.' Al-Mizan notes the plural includes his consenting circle, and that God's reply restricts might to Himself, His Messenger and the believers, leaving the hypocrites 'only abasement and ignorance.' Al-Tabarsi expands this into a homiletic five-fold enumeration of the might of God, of the Messenger, and of the believers; al-Tusi defines al-a'azz as the one most able to prevent, so that none is mightier than God and none more abased than the hypocrite. Al-Bahrani turns the same verse inward with a well-attested cluster from Imam al-Sadiq: 'God entrusted to the believer all his affairs but not that he abase himself... the believer is mightier than the mountain' -- and al-Hasan's retort that what others took for pride in him was in truth the God-given 'izza of this verse. Notably, al-Mizan appends a historical excursus questioning whether hypocrisy truly ended at the Prophet's death or its traces merely fell silent 'with the establishment of the caliphate' -- rendered here as he states it.