Tafsir al-Tasnim – Verse 5:67

The verse of communicating (tablīgh) · Translated from the Arabic edition of Tasnīm, vol. 23, pp. 468–518

The Verse

بِسْمِ ٱللَّهِ ٱلرَّحْمَـٰنِ ٱلرَّحِيمِ

In the name of Allah, the most Merciful, the most Compassionate

يَا أَيُّهَا الرَّسُولُ بَلِّغْ مَا أُنْزِلَ إِلَيْكَ مِنْ رَبِّكَ ۖ وَإِنْ لَمْ تَفْعَلْ فَمَا بَلَّغْتَ رِسَالَتَهُ ۚ وَاللَّهُ يَعْصِمُكَ مِنَ النَّاسِ ۗ إِنَّ اللَّهَ لَا يَهْدِي الْقَوْمَ الْكَافِرِينَ ﴿٦٧﴾

O Apostle! Communicate that which has been sent down to you from your Lord, and if you do not, you will not have communicated His message, and Allah shall protect you from the people. Indeed Allah does not guide the faithless lot. (67)

Summary of the Exegesis

The Most Noble Prophet (s.a.w.) is the Messenger of God Almighty and the means by which His revelation is conveyed to the people. Every shortcoming in conveying the revelation therefore counts, to that extent, as a shortcoming in communicating the message; but a shortcoming in communicating some of the commands, especially the important ones, means that the duty of the mission goes unfulfilled at its very root. The fact that this verse gives no indication of what this revelation of God (s.w.t.) actually is, is a sign of its greatness, its lofty standing and the extent of its importance, even though two of its features are mentioned in it: 1. Not communicating it is equivalent to not communicating the religion at its root. 2. Communicating it gives rise to fear on the part of the Greatest Prophet (s.a.w.).

On the other hand, that important revelation is neither the whole of the religion nor one of its subsidiary matters; rather, it is one of its principles, and in its application it is realised only through the wilāyah of ʿAlī ibn Abī Ṭālib (a.s.) and his imāmah. For this reason God (s.w.t.) warned with a threat should he fail to communicate [it], and then promised to protect the Most Noble Messenger (s.a.w.) from harm by the people, from the schemes of the unbelievers and from the rancour of the opponents of the religion.

Exegesis

Vocabulary

The words of this verse are explained in other volumes of Tasnīm: see note (1).

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The Special Address of Ennoblement and Honour

Know that the Glorious Qurʾān does not address those other than the prophets in a uniform way. At times it addresses them with the title ‘O mankind!’;(2) at other times with the expression ‘O People of the Book!’;(3) and at yet other times God Almighty addresses them with honour, saying: ‘O you who have faith!’(4)

As for the prophets (a.s.), He at times addresses them by their names, as in His words ‘O Noah’,(5)(6) His words ‘O Adam’,(7) His words ‘O Abraham’(8) and His words ‘O David!’;(9) but when He comes to the Most Noble Prophet (s.a.w.), He addresses him by the two noble titles of prophethood and messengership, as in His words ‘O Prophet!’(10) and His words (s.w.t.) ‘O Apostle!’. This special form of address reflects the Noble Qurʾān’s ennoblement and special honouring of the Greatest Prophet (s.a.w.), so much so that it forbade people to address the Messenger as they address one another, saying: ‘Do not consider the Apostle’s summons amongst you to be like your summoning one another.’(11)

In any case, wherever the discourse concerns the relationship between God Almighty and the Most Noble Prophet (s.a.w.) and the receiving of revelation from God (s.w.t.), the address is ‘O Prophet!’;(12) and wherever it concerns the relationship between the Greatest Prophet (s.a.w.) and the people, and the communicating of revelation to them, the address is ‘O Apostle!’. Likewise, the choice of the title of messengership intimates his status as one who has been sent; it means that he (s.a.w.), as far as his mission is concerned, has no duty other than to communicate what has been sent down to him from his Lord (s.w.t.).

Observations:

The first: The explicit command to communicate in His words ‘Communicate’ — used only in this noble verse — indicates the utmost concern for what it conveys. Likewise, the expression of God’s command as ‘that which has been sent down to you from your Lord’, and likewise the vagueness of the speech, serve only to honour and ennoble what is commanded in this noble verse.

The second: Some have set about giving this noble verse a different interpretation, saying: What counts is communicating the Noble Qurʾān with its particular meanings, its specific words and its definite composition, in a manner that is heard and seen, not with the words or the manner of composition changed, and the like.(13)

The basic claim — that the Noble Qurʾān, with all its characteristics of meaning, wording and composition, is ascribed to God Almighty and was sent down in this manner, without suffering any change or distortion — is true and accepted; but the meaning of the verse in question is something else, to which [that view] has not attended.

The Precedence of the Verse’s Internal Context over Its External Context

One of the general principles of exegesis, resorted to before examining the reports (the yield of the Lesser Weighty Thing [al-thiql al-aṣghar]) and likewise [before] the context of the other verses, is recourse to the context of the verse’s own speech; for the external indicator (qarīnah) is taken into account only after the internal indicator in the verse has been taken into account. For this reason, in the three cases, one must consider the context of the verses, or the context of a single verse, from different angles in order to reach a useful conclusion. They are:

1. Definite connection. If the import of a verse is a question and the content of what follows it is an answer to that question, then there is a definite connection and a unity of context between these two verses. Here are some examples of this case:

(a) The question about Dhū al-Qarnayn and its answer, in His words: ‘They question you concerning Dhul Qarnayn. Say, “I will relate to you an account of him.” Indeed We had granted him power in the land and given him the means to all things.’(14)

(b) The question of Moses (a.s.) and the answer of al-Khiḍr (a.s.), in His words: ‘Moses said to him, “May I follow you for the purpose that you teach me some of the probity you have been taught?” He said, “Indeed you cannot have patience with me!”’;(15) and likewise in two verses: ‘He said, “Did you make a hole in it to drown its people? You have certainly done a monstrous thing!” He said, “Did I not say that you cannot have patience with me?”’(16) In these verses Moses (a.s.) asked al-Khiḍr (a.s.) the reason for making a hole in the boat and for setting up the wall without payment, and al-Khiḍr (a.s.) answered what he had asked.(17)

(c) The question about the Spirit and its answer, in His words: ‘They question you concerning the Spirit. Say, “The Spirit is of the command of my Lord, and you have not been given of the knowledge except a few [of you].”’(18)

It is clear that these verses were sent down at one time, and it is understood from the unity of context that they speak about a single subject.

2. Absence of connection. Its prominent example is His words: ‘Today I have perfected your religion for you, and I have completed My blessing upon you, and I have approved Islam as your religion’;(19) for this came after His words (s.w.t.): ‘You are prohibited carrion, blood, the flesh of swine, and what has been offered to other than Allah, and the animal strangled or beaten to death, and that which dies by falling or is gored to death, and that which is mangled by a beast of prey—barring that which you may purify—and what is sacrificed on stone altars [to idols], and that you should divide by raffling with arrows. All that is transgression.’(20) Then He said directly: ‘Today the faithless have despaired of your religion. So do not fear them, but fear Me. Today I have perfected your religion for you, and I have completed My blessing upon you, and I have approved Islam as your religion.’(21) It has rightly been explained that the sending down of a number of juristic rulings, such as the subsidiary matters mentioned in the noble verse, does not cause the unbelievers to despair; moreover, these rulings had been sent down before Sūrat al-Māʾidah, which was sent down in the last part of the noble life of the Most Noble Prophet (s.a.w.).(22) On the basis of these two indicators, therefore, the two words ‘Today’ — repeated twice to show its importance — are not connected with the prohibition of carrion, blood, the flesh of swine and the other matters mentioned in the noble verse.

On this basis, either this passage of the verse was not sent down with the preceding passage, or, if it is said to have been sent down together with it, it is a parenthetical sentence placed among these matters for some wise purpose, with no connection or relation whatever to what comes before and after it. This is the case in a scholarly discussion or a spoken address when the discussant or speaker turns to warn whoever is listening to his discussion or address about some matter, or to caution him against some danger: this warning or caution is connected neither with what preceded it in the speaker’s words nor with what he brings after it; yet it is not idle either, but may at times serve an important purpose.

3. Uncertainty regarding connection. Many verses of the Noble Qurʾān are of this kind: a verse falls among verses that may have been sent down together with it. In such instances the context of the preceding and following verses is drawn upon to clarify the meaning of that verse; and besides the unity of context there may be another indicator as well, as when the verse contains a verb whose complement (mutaʿallaq) falls in the following verse. Examples of this are His words: ‘Thus does Allah clarify His signs for you so that you may reflect about the world and the Hereafter. And they ask you concerning the orphans. Say, “It is better to set right their affairs, and if you intermingle with them, they are of course your brothers: Allah knows those who cause corruption from those who set things right, and had Allah wished He would have put you to hardship.” Indeed Allah is all-mighty, all-wise.’;(23) and His words (s.w.t.): ‘Be aware that it is out of their mendacity that they say, “Allah has begotten [offsprings],” and they indeed speak a falsehood.’(24)

This being so, and having acquainted ourselves with these premises, let us now pause at the context of the verse under exegesis.

The internal context: The internal context of the noble verse becomes clear through two points: (a) God Almighty commanded His Most Noble Prophet (s.a.w.) to communicate a new revelation to the people, and this emphatic command was accompanied by a severe threat: were this revelation not communicated, the mission would not have been fulfilled at its very root. (b) God (s.w.t.) promised to protect the Greatest Prophet (s.a.w.) from the schemes of the people and the harm of the unbelievers. Leaving aside the context of the preceding and following verses, then, the meaning of the verse is very clear.

The external context: The subject of the preceding and following verses is the rebuke of the People of the Book for turning away from the commands of God (s.w.t.) and committing what is forbidden. Thus He (s.w.t.) said in the preceding verse: ‘Had they observed the Torah and the Evangel, and what was sent down to them from their Lord, they would surely have drawn nourishment from above them and from beneath their feet. There is an upright group among them, but evil is what many of them do.’;(25) and in the following verse He said: ‘Say, “O People of the Book! You do not stand on anything until you observe the Torah and the Evangel and what was sent down to you from your Lord.” Surely many of them will be increased in rebellion and unfaith by what has been sent down to you from your Lord. So do not grieve for the faithless lot.’(26)

If we took the noble verse to share one context with the verses before and after it, then God Almighty would, in this verse, have emphatically commanded the Most Noble Messenger (s.a.w.) to communicate to the People of the Book what had been sent down from his Lord concerning them: ‘Communicate that which has been sent down to you from your Lord’. The internal and external indicators, however, point to a complete break between the subject of the noble verse and the preceding and following verses. They are:

1. It is understood from His words ‘and Allah shall protect you from the people’ that the ruling the Most Noble Prophet (s.a.w.) was commanded to communicate to the people is an important matter whose communicating entails danger and harm to the Greatest Messenger (s.a.w.); whereas the People of the Book at that time were in no position to harm the Most Noble Prophet (s.a.w.) in any way, or to inflict damage on the religion, such that either of these could be a reason for delaying or hesitating in communicating the revelation. This is so from several aspects. The first: Had what was meant by the danger been their inflicting harm, these verses would have had to be sent down in the early years of the noble Hijrah — a period when the Prophet (s.a.w.) was living as a stranger in Medina with a few of his Companions, surrounded by the Jews — and not in the last part of his noble life, when the People of the Book had grown weak on every side and been stripped of power, so that at that time no harm to the Greatest Messenger (s.a.w.) was to be expected from them.

The bulk of the discussion of the People of the Book came in Sūrat al-Māʾidah, and there is no doubt that the noble verse was also sent down in this sūrah; and according to what history reports, the Jews at that time were weak and unable to scheme or to inflict harm. No ground can therefore be conceived for the Most Noble Prophet (s.a.w.) to fear them.(27)

The second: The verse contains no arduous obligation upon the People of the Book such that communicating it would expose the Messenger of God (s.a.w.) to danger.

2. At the beginning of the noble mission (biʿthah), the Most Noble Prophet (s.a.w.) was commanded to communicate to the unbelievers of Quraysh, who were extreme in their unbelief, obligations that carried danger for him, such as tawḥīd and abandoning the worship of idols; and Quraysh were a greater danger to him than the People of the Book. Yet God did not promise him protection from the schemes and attacks of Quraysh. This makes clear that the subject of this noble verse is the most dangerous of the subjects that the Most Noble Prophet (s.a.w.) was newly charged with communicating.

3. The external indicators, such as the narrations and the historical reports, support [the view] that this verse was sent down concerning the wilāyah of ʿAlī ibn Abī Ṭālib (a.s.). Accordingly, there is no doubt that the internal context of the verse takes precedence over its external context, and that this verse has no connection with the verses that precede and follow it.

Discussion of the Possibility that the Noble Verse Is Specific to the People of the Book

Some Sunni exegetes have held that this verse is connected with the noble verses before it: the preceding verses relate the prohibition against taking the Jews and the Christians as allies, and now the Muslims must keep away from them and dissociate themselves from them.(28)

Fakhr al-Dīn al-Rāzī put forward ten aspects as the occasion of the revelation of this noble verse, and in the tenth he mentioned the ḥadīth of Ghadīr and the wilāyah of the Commander of the Faithful (a.s.); yet he held that the verse is connected with what precedes it, which gives an account of the Jews and their affairs.(29)

As you have learnt earlier, the possibility that this verse is connected with verses before it, such as His words: ‘O you who have faith! Do not take the Jews and the Christians for allies: they are allies of each other. Any of you who allies with them is indeed one of them. Indeed Allah does not guide the wrongdoing lot’,(30) entails consequences that require it to be rejected. One of these consequences is that the Most Noble Prophet (s.a.w.) would be told: ‘Do not fear the Jews’; yet at the time this verse was sent down, the Jews — of the Banū al-Naḍīr, the Banū Qaynuqāʿ, the Banū Qurayẓah and the people of Khaybar — were weak and powerless: they were fearful, with no say in affairs and no way of escape.

The verses of Sūrat al-Ḥashr make it apparent that the victory of the Muslims, the like of which had not been seen before, caused the Jews to leave Medina, whereas before that they had been strong and powerful. Likewise, the dominion of Islam over the Ḥijāz and the assumption of the leadership of society by Imams appointed by God (s.w.t.) — all of this left no room for fear of the Jews, whether at present or in the future.

The gist of what has been said is this: how could the Most Noble Prophet (s.a.w.) fear the Jews in communicating some matter, when at that time they were weak and humbled, while he (may the blessings of God be upon him and his family) was commanded to communicate to them, without fear, what was far more dangerous than that — such as communicating His words (s.w.t.): ‘Be you spurned apes’;(31) and His words: ‘as We cursed the People of the Sabbath’;(32) and His words (s.w.t.): ‘they were struck with abasement and poverty, and they earned Allah’s wrath’?(33)

Considering the Verse Itself

The first stage in arriving at the import of the verse itself is to know the position of the Most Noble Messenger (s.a.w.) regarding the communicating of this important matter — whether or not there were obstacles — at the time His words (s.w.t.) were sent down: ‘O Apostle! Communicate that which has been sent down to you from your Lord, and if you do not, you will not have communicated His message, and Allah shall protect you from the people. Indeed Allah does not guide the faithless lot.’ Here, then, are some points on this subject:

The Most Noble Prophet (s.a.w.) as presented by the Qurʾān: The Noble Qurʾān has made known [concerning] the Greatest Messenger (s.a.w.) that he may not move his tongue before the revelation is sent down to him, saying, as it relates the prohibition of God (s.w.t.): ‘Do not move your tongue with it to hasten it. Indeed it is up to Us to put it together and to recite it.’(34) The content of this noble verse is the import of His words: ‘Nor does he speak out of [his own] desire: it is just a revelation that is revealed [to him]’;(35) that is, everything that issues from the Greatest Prophet (s.a.w.) is nothing but revelation. He is therefore not miserly in communicating the Unseen from God (s.w.t.), and this is what the noble verse points to: ‘and he is not miserly concerning the Unseen.’(36)

On the basis of these verses, the Most Noble Messenger (s.a.w.) is characterised by two attributes:

The first attribute: All his sayings are revelation from God Almighty, and so they were not based on whims [and he is infallibly protected from that (may the blessings of God Almighty be upon him)];(37) for he is a perfect human being who speaks only by revelation from God (s.w.t.), not out of desire, so what he utters is revelation itself.

The second attribute: Everything that God Almighty sent down to His Prophet as revelation from Him, he communicated to the people, for he is not miserly with what was sent down to him; so he concealed nothing of it at all.

Considering the Possible Obstacles to Communicating Revelation

There may have been four basic obstacles to the communicating of the Most Noble Prophet (s.a.w.), under which all other obstacles fall: 1. financial crises and economic siege; 2. social and psychological crises, such as doing what brings about isolation and ridicule; 3. political crises, such as the politicians paying him no regard because of the political isolation of the Most Noble Prophet (s.a.w.); 4. fear of possible wars.

These obstacles were present at the beginning of the mission, but, as the Noble Qurʾān reports, the Greatest Messenger (s.a.w.) safeguarded his message and the communicating of his revelation, and none of them affected the communicating of his message. From this it is known that at the time the noble verse was sent down — that is, after the conquest of Mecca and the domination of the Arabian Peninsula: ‘When Allah’s help comes with victory’(38) — financial crisis and economic siege were not [such as] to prevent his communicating (s.a.w.); for in the days of want, poverty and economic siege he had been patient and grateful. Nor did he (s.a.w.) desist in the days when the hypocrites issued their threat, frightening the people [away] from helping him (s.a.w.) with wealth and saying: ‘Do not spend on those who are with the Apostle of Allah until they scatter off [from around him]’;(39) nor, likewise, did he draw back from it in the days of the economic crises in the Shiʿb of Abū Ṭālib (a.s.). How, then, can it be said that he desisted from communicating the religion in the days of Islam’s power and strength?(40)

The Most Noble Prophet (s.a.w.) bore the harm the people did him and endured their mockery; they did all this to put psychological pressure on him (s.a.w.) so that he (may the blessings of God be upon him) would withdraw. But God commanded him to be patient and steadfast, saying to him: ‘So proclaim what you have been commanded, and turn away from the polytheists. Indeed We will suffice you against the deriders.’(41)

Likewise, when he stood alone in military affairs and in the wars that prevailed, God (s.w.t.) commanded him to fight the unbelievers even if no one helped him, saying to him: ‘So fight in the way of Allah: you are responsible only for yourself, but urge on the faithful [to fight]. Maybe Allah will curb the might of the faithless, for Allah is greatest in might and severest in punishment.’(42)

One of the special characteristics of the Messenger of God (s.a.w.) is that it was not permissible for him to flee from the battlefield, even if he remained on it alone. What, then, would he (s.a.w.) have to fear now, when all the politicians and military men had become weak? For in courage he stood at such a rank that one such as the Commander of the Faithful (a.s.), with his courage and heroism, would take refuge in him. It has been reported from him (a.s.) that he said: ‘Whenever the fighting grew fierce, we would shield ourselves with the Messenger of God (s.a.w.), and none of us was nearer to the enemy than he.’(43)

All the prophets (a.s.) were free of fear of any other than God Almighty and were monotheists in their fear, as God (s.w.t.) has described them: ‘such as deliver the messages of Allah and fear Him, and fear no one except Allah, and Allah suffices as reckoner.’(44) If this is the state of the prophets, what then of their Seal (may the blessings of God be upon him and his family)?

Accordingly, none of the social, economic and political crises, nor military fear either, stands as an obstacle to communicating the command of God (s.w.t.). What is apparent from the noble verse, however, is that the Most Noble Prophet (s.a.w.) was hesitant in communicating this matter, fearful of it, and waiting for a suitable time for it. For this reason God Almighty told him that if he did not do [it], it would be as though he had not communicated the very message of God (s.w.t.): ‘and if you do not, you will not have communicated His message’; He then promised him protection from the schemes of the people and the attacks of the unbelievers: ‘and Allah shall protect you from the people.’ Had the Greatest Prophet (s.a.w.) felt no fear and made no delay in this, there would have been no need for a threat and a promise of protection; for neither of these occurred in the verses of the beginning of the mission.

In line with what has been mentioned, to arrive at the nature of the fear of the Most Noble Prophet (s.a.w.) and the reason for his delay in communicating the revelation, one must consider the command of God (s.w.t.), that is, ‘that which has been sent down to you from your Lord’, to see what the important thing in this communicating was.

Two possibilities are entertained concerning God’s ruling, that is, concerning ‘that which has been sent down to you from your Lord’: that it is the whole of the religion, or some of its rulings.(45)

It can hardly be that the whole of the religion of God (s.w.t.) is what is meant by it, for [several] reasons:

The first: it entails that the verse was sent down at the beginning of the mission, not at the end of the life of the Most Noble Messenger (s.a.w.).

The second: it entails that the condition and the consequence — the antecedent and the consequent — are one and the same; the verse would then mean: If you do not communicate the whole of the religion, you will not have communicated His message, that is, the whole of the religion — and this is meaningless.

As the author of al-Manār relates, some of the exegetes held that the verse is connected with communicating the very principle of the religion and was sent down in Mecca at the beginning of Islam, but was placed in Sūrat al-Māʾidah, the Medinan [sūrah] sent down at the end of the noble Hijrah [period].(46)

The answer to all of this is that a Meccan verse occurring in a Medinan sūrah is possible in principle, as is the reverse; but it is contrary to the default assumption, so proving it requires a strong demonstration, and here there is none — not to mention the numerous indications showing that the noble verse cannot have been sent down at the beginning of Islam.

These exegetes do not accept these indications and proofs because of the conflict that arises between adhering to what these indications and proofs require and their theological belief. They had already shown a similar rejection in not accepting that His words: ‘An asker asked for a punishment sure to befall —which none can avert from the faithless —’(47) were sent down concerning ʿAlī ibn Abī Ṭālib (a.s.).(48) And they contradicted this position of theirs by what they held regarding the first verses of Sūrat al-Maʿārij, namely that (the story of al-Ḥārith ibn al-Nuʿmān) could not be placed in a Meccan sūrah (Sūrat al-Maʿārij); from which it is known [they said] that these verses are not connected with the ḥadīth of Ghadīr, which took place during the lifetime of the Greatest Prophet (s.a.w.) in Medina;(50) and so they regarded this narration as fabricated.(51) Furthermore, since some have held that Sūrat al-Maʿārij is Medinan,(52) it cannot be judged definitively to be Meccan. In addition, even if the claim of the author of al-Manār and those who followed him in it were sound — that Sūrat al-Maʿārij is Meccan, just as others claimed that His words: ‘O Apostle! Communicate that which has been sent down to you from your Lord, and if you do not, you will not have communicated His message, and Allah shall protect you from the people. Indeed Allah does not guide the faithless lot’ were sent down in Mecca but placed in a Medinan sūrah — then a Medinan verse connected with al-Ḥārith ibn al-Nuʿmān (al-Nuʿmān ibn al-Ḥārith) occurring in a Meccan sūrah, that is, Sūrat al-Maʿārij, is likewise not objectionable.

As for the possibility that the noble verse was sent down independently at the beginning of Islam, or before the Hijrah, without being included in any particular sūrah, and that Sūrat al-Māʾidah was later sent down at the end of the noble life of the Greatest Messenger (s.a.w.) and [the verse] was then placed in it — this is utterly far-fetched.

The upshot of what we have mentioned is that the possibility that ‘that which has been sent down to you from your Lord’ means the whole of the religion is likewise rejected.

But if part of the religion is meant, it cannot be one of the subsidiary matters (furūʿ), since most of them, such as prayer, zakāt, fasting and ḥajj, are mentioned in the Noble Qurʾān. What the Most Noble Prophet (s.a.w.) feared, then, was not one of the subsidiary matters, and His words ‘that which has been sent down to you from your Lord’ therefore refer to one of the principles (uṣūl).

From another angle, this matter does not refer to tawḥīd either; for God Almighty mentioned it in more than one of the Medinan and Meccan sūrahs and communicated it to the Most Noble Prophet (s.a.w.) as revelation, and he communicated it to the people.

The claim that what is meant by it is general prophethood, the rulings of the mission, the challenge [of the Qurʾān] (taḥaddī) and the like is likewise refuted; for the Most Noble Messenger (s.a.w.) communicated all of that, without fear or delay, before this verse was sent down.

The view that it refers to matters concerning the People of the Book is likewise rejected; for, as you have learnt, many of the matters concerning them were sent down before this verse and were communicated without fear, such as His words: ‘Be you spurned apes’;(53) and His words: ‘as We cursed the People of the Sabbath’;(54) and His words (s.w.t.): ‘they were struck with abasement and poverty, and they earned Allah’s wrath.’(55)

That the content of the verse is a matter concerning the hypocrites is likewise unsound; for verses had been sent down before it that described hypocrisy as a sickness and censured the hypocrites for it,(56) and the Greatest Prophet (s.a.w.) set about communicating them without fear or delay. The hypocrites, then, denied their hypocrisy, since they had no argument to hold on to; so they were [such that]: ‘When they meet the faithful, they say, “We believe,” but when they are alone with their devils, they say, “We are with you; we were only deriding [them].”’(57)

What has been said — that the verse was sent down concerning the polytheists — is likewise false; for the Most Noble Prophet (s.a.w.) argued against them with the verses of tawḥīd more than once, and after conquering Mecca he broke their idols into pieces while they looked on.

After considering the internal indications of the verse, then, the conclusion of all this is clear: what is meant by ‘that which has been sent down to you from your Lord’ is neither the whole of the religion nor its subsidiary matters; rather, it is one of its principles, with two attributes:

The first: its importance, such that, were the Most Noble Messenger (s.a.w.) not to communicate it, he would not have communicated anything of the religion at all: ‘and if you do not, you will not have communicated His message.’

The second: the delay of the Most Noble Prophet (s.a.w.) in communicating it, out of his fear concerning it; for this reason God (s.w.t.) promised him protection: ‘and Allah shall protect you from the people.’

There is no doubt that this important matter was nothing other than the wilāyah of ʿAlī ibn Abī Ṭālib (a.s.) and his succession (khilāfah) after the Greatest Messenger (s.a.w.); for these two comprise the two attributes mentioned, and nothing else does.

Discussion of Some Explanations of ‘You Will Not Have Communicated His Message’

Some exegetes have held that its meaning is: ‘Then you will not have communicated what you were charged with of conveying the messages, and you will not have conveyed any of them at all. That is because some of them are no more deserving of being conveyed than others; and if you did not convey some of them, it is as though you had neglected conveying them all, just as whoever does not believe in some of them is like one who does not believe in all of them, since each of them has the same bearing as the others. Being so, they are in the status of a single thing; and a single thing cannot be both communicated and not communicated, both believed in and not believed in. … If you say: How is it sound for His words ‘you will not have communicated His message’ to occur as the apodosis of the condition? I say: There are two aspects to it. The first: if he did not obey God’s command in communicating the messages and concealed them all, as though He had not sent a messenger, it would be a hideous matter whose hideousness is not hidden. So it was said: If you do not communicate the least thing of them, even if it is a single word, you are like one who has committed the hideous matter that is the concealment of them all; just as He made the killing of a soul something enormous by His words ‘is as though he had killed all mankind’.(58) The second: that what is meant is: If you do not do [it], then yours is the punishment that the concealment of the whole of revelation entails; so He put the cause in place of the effect.’(59)

The traces of deviation thus appear plainly in exegeses of this kind. Once the correct meaning of the noble verse has become clear, there is no need to reply to these difficulties.

Fakhr al-Dīn al-Rāzī disputed the answer given by the majority of the exegetes — that leaving some is equivalent to leaving the whole — and said: ‘This answer is weak in my view. For if it were said of one who performed some and left some that he had left the whole, it would be a lie; and if it were also said that the extent of the offence in leaving some is like the extent of the offence in leaving the whole, that too is absurd and impossible. So this answer falls. The soundest [view] in my opinion is to say that this has come out on the pattern of his saying, “I am Abū al-Najm, and my poetry is my poetry”; its meaning is that my poetry has reached such a degree of perfection and eloquence that whenever it is said of it, “It is my poetry,” its praise has reached the utmost limit, beyond which nothing can be added. So these words convey complete intensification from this aspect. So it is here: “If you do not communicate His message, you will not have communicated His message”; that is, the leaving of communicating cannot be described with a threat greater than [saying] that it is the leaving of communicating. That was thus a warning of the utmost threat and menace; and God knows best.’(60)

Concerning “I am Abū al-Najm, and my poetry is my poetry”, the master, ʿAllāmah Ṭabāṭabāʾī, said something different from what Fakhr al-Dīn al-Rāzī said. He said: ‘So what is meant is: Communicate this ruling; and if you do not communicate it, you will not have communicated the root of His message, or the whole of it. This is a sound and reasonable meaning, and the speech then comes in a setting like that in which the saying of Abū al-Najm came: “I am Abū al-Najm, and my poetry is my poetry.” As for this ruling being such that, were it not communicated, it would be as though you had not communicated the message, that is only because the teachings and rulings of the religion are bound up with one another, such that if one matter among them were neglected, all of them would be neglected, especially in communicating, because of the completeness of the bond. This construal, though unobjectionable in itself, is not in keeping with the end of the verse, namely His words ‘and Allah shall protect you from the people. Indeed Allah does not guide the faithless lot’. For this ending discloses that a faithless lot among the people had resolved to oppose this ruling that had been sent down, or that it was to be expected from their state that they would oppose it fiercely and take whatever measure they could to nullify this call and leave it in vain, having no effect and bringing no benefit. And God promised His Messenger that He would protect him from them, bring their scheming to nothing and not guide them in their plotting.’(61)

Note: What happened at the death of the Greatest Messenger (s.a.w.), when some refused to bring the pen and the inkwell,(62) did not arise from any shortcoming on his part (s.a.w.), for he (s.a.w.) had communicated all the messages of God (s.w.t.) and had not fallen short in doing so. It was only that some of the people refused to bring him the pen and the inkwell.

The Reason for the Most Noble Prophet’s (s.a.w.) Fear of Communicating the Wilāyah

The Most Noble Prophet (s.a.w.) was afraid of communicating the wilāyah, but his fear was not for himself. For he was always ready to communicate the command of God (s.w.t.), even at the sacrifice of his life and his wealth; and the best proof of this is his various wars against the faithless and the polytheists. Indeed, he (s.a.w.) was not afraid of Abū Sufyān, who had outwardly embraced Islam, for he was among those about whom it has come [in a report]: ‘The people did not embrace Islam; rather, they submitted [outwardly]’;(63) nor was he afraid of the wealthy Jews who afterwards became poor: ‘And He dragged down from their strongholds those who had backed them from among the People of the Book, and He cast terror into their hearts, [so that] you killed a part of them, and took captive [another] part.’(64) Rather, they were afflicted in a way that no one, near or far, would have believed of their state, as God (s.w.t.) described them: ‘It is He who expelled the faithless belonging to the People of the Book from their homes at the outset of [their] en masse banishment. You did not think that they would go out, and they thought their fortresses would protect them from Allah. But Allah came at them from whence they did not suppose and He cast terror into their hearts. They demolish their houses with their own hands and the hands of the faithful. So take lesson, O you who have insight!’(65) What these proofs show, then, is that the Greatest Prophet (s.a.w.) was not afraid of them for himself; rather, he was afraid, for the very principle of the religion, of the hypocrites’ misguiding, their plotting and their sowing of discord. For he (s.a.w.) had stripped them of every strength, authority and means they had, and nothing remained but to communicate the succession (khilāfah) after him. His fear was of one thing: that if, in the circumstances then prevailing, he communicated to the people the important [matter of] the wilāyah of ʿAlī ibn Abī Ṭālib (a.s.), the hypocrites would hold back from it. For although they had kept silent about the verses sent down against hypocrisy and the hypocrites, having no way [to oppose them] at that time, and had not afterwards set about plotting against them, with the wilāyah and the matter of the succession there was the possibility that some people would waver, and that the hypocrites would say: The one who claimed prophethood ruled over the people for a period of time, and now he has handed the government over to his son-in-law, so that we may be under his authority and his dominion.

Yes! Those among the people who were new to Islam lacked deep reflection and had no share of a faith that had entered the root of the heart, such that they could thereby stand firm in the face of doubts. There was therefore a strong possibility that they would be deceived and turn back on their heels as a result of the hypocrites’ misguiding, and that the Most Noble Prophet (s.a.w.) would then be tried with entering into war with those new to Islam. The upshot of what we have mentioned is that, should this come about from the hypocrites, there was the possibility of harm befalling the religion.

The conclusion of all this is that the Greatest Prophet (s.a.w.) held back in this matter out of fear of the hypocrites’ plotting, their collusion with the polytheists of the Ḥijāz and their kindling of the fire of discord, so that they would turn those new to Islam back to faithlessness after their faith. He was awaiting a suitable opportunity to communicate the wilāyah of the Commander of the Faithful, ʿAlī ibn Abī Ṭālib (a.s.), until the command was sent down to him to communicate it, for its time had now come: ‘and Allah shall protect you from the people. Indeed Allah does not guide the faithless lot.’

On this basis, his fear was praiseworthy and reasonable, since it was for the preservation of the religion, not for himself; just as God (s.w.t.) does not bring about what would harm the religion.

Let us pause here over some examples of praiseworthy fear:

1. Verses, from His words (s.w.t.): ‘Were it not [for the danger] that mankind would be one community, We would have made for those who defy the All-beneficent, silver roofs for their houses and [silver] stairways by which they ascend, and [silver] doors for their houses and [silver] couches on which they recline, and ornaments of gold; yet all that would be nothing but the wares of the life of this world, and the Hereafter is for the Godwary near your Lord.’(66)

Its meaning is that, were it not for the fear of people fleeing from religion to the world, the faithless would have been given such a measure of wealth that they would feel no poverty and would forget God Almighty, and He would strip them of [a good] end; but if they were given all that, people’s apostasy is to be feared.

2. His words (s.w.t.): ‘and you feared the people though Allah is worthier that you should fear Him’.(67) The Most Noble Prophet’s (s.a.w.) marriage to the wife of Zayd (the stepson of the Greatest Messenger)(68) was a departure from a custom, one that could give rise to objection and apostasy; for that reason he (s.a.w.) was apprehensive about it.

3. His words (s.w.t.): ‘Then Moses felt a fear within his heart.’(69) After Moses, the one who spoke [with God] (a.s.), had attained all the ranks of prophethood and completed the proof against Pharaoh, Pharaoh set out to challenge him. He settled on a plan: all the sorcerers and masters of conjuring from every part of Egypt were to gather and dispute with Moses (a.s.). At that, Pharaoh said to them: ‘So when they threw, they bewitched the people’s eyes and overawed them, producing a tremendous magic.’(70)(71) Then Moses (a.s.) was afraid, and He (s.w.t.) said to him: ‘Do not be afraid. Indeed, you will have the upper hand.’(72) It has been narrated from the Imam, the Commander of the Faithful (a.s.), that he said: ‘Moses did not feel fear for himself; he was apprehensive of the dominance of the ignorant and the reign of misguidance.’(73) This, then, is an instance of praiseworthy fear.

Protecting the Standing of the Most Noble Prophet (s.a.w.)

It is apparent from the foregoing that what is meant by ‘and Allah shall protect you from the people’ is not the protection of the person of the Most Noble Prophet (s.a.w.); rather, what is meant by it(74) is only the protection of his religious standing (shakhṣiyyah) (God’s blessings be upon him and his family), which bears on the survival of Islam, its very root. Otherwise, it would follow that he had been afraid on the Night of the Bed (laylat al-mabīt), when the polytheists sought his life,(75) and that this promise had been sent down at that time; yet that did not happen. Rather, He commanded him: Do what you have been commanded, and emigrate from Mecca to Medina. On that night there was [the prospect of] killing and the shedding of blood, as God Almighty said concerning ʿAlī (a.s.), who spent that night in the place of the Greatest Prophet (s.a.w.): ‘And among the people is he who sells his soul seeking the pleasure of Allah, and Allah is most kind to [His] servants.’(76) Yet He did not promise to protect it [his life], even though He had decreed his protection and preservation.

Unless it be said that the Most Noble Prophet (s.a.w.) feared being killed, leaving the religion incomplete, so that what he had accomplished in communicating the message during those years would be lost; and that for this reason he held back and hesitated in communicating this ruling, awaiting the suitable opportunity that would be free of this harm. But attention must be paid to [the fact] that God (s.w.t.) had made His Prophet the first emanation and the communicator of His rulings, and he (s.a.w.) was a pure servant of God (s.w.t.), as required by the verse ‘You have no hand in the matter’;(77) for the matter belongs to God (s.w.t.) alone. So, supposing the Most Noble Prophet (s.a.w.) were killed, God would keep His religion surviving and alive without any need of him (s.a.w.).

Know that when the words of God (s.w.t.) ‘and Allah shall protect you from the people’ were sent down, the Messenger of God (s.a.w.) informed the guards among his Companions that(78) and said to them: ‘Go back to your quarters, for God Almighty has protected me from the people.’(79) Despite all this, it cannot be said that what is meant by the verse is only the protection of the person of the Most Noble Prophet (s.a.w.) — and that is if the soundness of it [the report] is granted. The Greatest Prophet (s.a.w.) was in awe of the people only because of the political and social matters that affect the survival of their religion.

Note: What happened on the day of Uḥud and the like is not inconsistent with His words ‘and Allah shall protect you from the people’, since it was sent down at the end of the noble life of the Most Noble Messenger (s.a.w.). Moreover, what was intended was the protection of the standing of the Messenger of God (s.a.w.).

What Is Meant by “the People”

The Noble Qurʾān uses [the word] “the people” (al-nās) in varying ways: sometimes unqualified, and sometimes accompanied by good or bad descriptions. Here are some instances of its use:

1. The nature of the people as including both good and evil, in His words: ‘O mankind! Indeed, We created you from a male and a female’.(80)

2. The nature of the people as including honour accompanied by praise, in His words: ‘The month of Ramadan is one in which the Quran was sent down as guidance to mankind, with manifest proofs of guidance and the Criterion’;(81) for in it “the people” are mentioned with honour and guidance.

3. The nature of the people as including blame, in His words: ‘most people do not know’.(82)

In the noble verse [under discussion], “the people” are mentioned with blame, for He said: ‘and Allah shall protect you from the people’. Here the word applies to the hypocrites who used to harm the Greatest Prophet (s.a.w.), and God promised him that He would protect his standing (shakhṣiyyah) and his religion from their schemes.

The Deprivation of the Unbeliever of Creative Guidance

The guidance meant in His words (s.w.t.) ‘Indeed Allah does not guide the faithless lot’ is not legislative guidance (al-hidāyah al-tashrīʿiyyah), for God (s.w.t.) has bestowed this effusion of grace on all. What is meant, then, is the guidance of enabling grace (al-hidāyah al-tawfīqiyyah): God Almighty brings the scheming and plotting of the unbelievers to nothing, so that they remain disappointed in it. From this we know that when this noble verse was sent down — that is, in the tenth year of the Hijrah — there were those who lay in wait for the religion, awaiting [for it] the calamity of misguidance, and who wished to fall upon its people in a single assault, even though they failed every time. This loss of guidance on the part of the unbelievers, and their failure, is the counterpart of their plotting mentioned in the verses of the Noble Qurʾān, such as His words (s.w.t.): ‘Then they plotted [against Jesus], and Allah also devised, and Allah is the best of devisers’;(83) His words: ‘due to their domineering [conduct] in the land and their devising of evil schemes; and evil schemes beset only their authors’;(84) and His words (s.w.t.): ‘They certainly devised their plots, but their plots are known to Allah, and their plots are not such as to dislodge the mountains’.(85)(86) This means that, even if they had a plot that would make the mountains pass away, God (s.w.t.) would make their plot barren, because ‘their plots are known to Allah’ [literally, “with Allah are their plots”].

Plotting and scheming are [acts] by which someone intends to come between the Muslims and their goals; but God brings such plotting and scheming to nothing, and their plotting then rebounds upon themselves.

At first sight it would seem that the Muslim and the other each have a plot, so that in the end one of them succeeds and the other is overcome. The final view, however, is the proposition that plots and schemes are with God (s.w.t.);(87) for He did not give the unbelievers respite to plot and to inflict any harm on God’s religion so as to destroy its root by their plotting — even if, in the course of this, it was possible for some of the Muslims to be killed and some of their places destroyed.

In this noble verse the Noble Qurʾān has described the hypocrites as unbelievers, saying: ‘Indeed Allah does not guide the faithless lot’. What is meant by them is everyone who rejected the wilāyah of ʿAlī ibn Abī Ṭālib (a.s.), whether they were unbelievers in creed or unbelievers in practice. For those who turned away from accepting the wilāyah of the Commander of the Faithful (a.s.) were the hypocrites who outwardly professed Islam, and it was they whom the Most Noble Prophet (s.a.w.) feared in communicating the matter of the wilāyah of ʿAlī ibn Abī Ṭālib (a.s.). What is meant by them is not unbelievers without qualification. God (s.w.t.) then promised His Messenger protection from their harm and their plotting.

Allusions and Subtleties

1. Discussion of the Statement of the Author of al-Manār on the Ḥadīth of Ghadīr

The author of al-Manār stated in his exegesis that the ḥadīth does not indicate the wilāyah of authority, which is the imāmah or the succession (khilāfah); that this word is not used in the Qurʾān in this sense; and that what is meant by wilāyah in it is rather the wilāyah of help and affection.(88)

This is rejected, for at Ghadīr Khumm the Most Noble Prophet (s.a.w.) said, ‘Of whomever I am the master (mawlā), ʿAlī is his master,’(89) after he had set out universal principles of the religion and, by reciting His words (s.w.t.) ‘The Prophet is closer to the faithful than their own souls’,(90) had taken the people’s acknowledgement that he was closer to them than their own selves and their property. So wilāyah in the ḥadīth of Ghadīr means the wilāyah of disposal (wilāyat al-taṣarruf), not the wilāyah of love and help. Otherwise, the Greatest Prophet (s.a.w.) would have recited to them before it His words: ‘the faithful, men and women, are comrades of one another’,(91) in which wilāyah means the wilāyah of love and help, not the wilāyah of disposal.

2. The Knowledge of the Infallible Imam (a.s.)

The question of the knowledge of ʿAlī ibn Abī Ṭālib (a.s.) and of the other infallible Imams (God’s blessings be upon them all) is foreign to this context, and the author of al-Manār’s(92) bringing it in here is not well founded. For the Noble Qurʾān is a reality whose descended end is a clear Arabic [Qurʾān] and whose lofty end is ‘sublime and wise’;(93)(94) and the sending down of this reality is the sending down of a firm rope, not the sending down of raindrops. Likewise, the column of this reality and its extension encompass the worlds of nature, of the image (al-mithāl) and of the intellect; that is, they contain everything in this contingent world. So the perfect, infallible human being, who has become mingled with this reality and has held fast to its firm rope, will never be parted from it. He possesses many kinds of knowledge that others among the common people do not possess, just as the Qurʾān holds within it great kinds of knowledge that other books do not possess. These sublime teachings, moreover, have no connection with the Bāṭinīs, who disregard the outward [meanings]. The effort of the author of al-Manār is therefore of no avail to him, or to others who have followed his path, before or after.

Discussion of the Narrations

1. The Occasion of Revelation

— From Ibn ʿAbbās, concerning the words of God, Mighty and Majestic: ‘O Apostle! Communicate that which has been sent down to you from your Lord’ — the verse — [he said:] ‘It was sent down concerning ʿAlī. The Messenger of God (s.a.w.) was commanded to communicate concerning him; so the Messenger of God (s.a.w.) took ʿAlī by the hand and said: “Of whomever I am the master, ʿAlī is his master. O God, befriend whoever befriends him, and be the enemy of whoever is his enemy.”’(95)

— From Ibn ʿAbbās and Jābir ibn ʿAbd Allāh, who both said: ‘God, Exalted is He, commanded His Prophet Muḥammad (s.a.w.) to set up ʿAlī (a.s.) as a banner for the people, to inform them of his wilāyah. The Messenger of God (s.a.w.) feared that they would say, “He has favoured his cousin,” and that they(96) would revile him for that. So God revealed to him: “O Apostle! Communicate that which has been sent down to you from your Lord, and if you do not, you will not have communicated His message, and Allah shall protect you from the people”. Then the Messenger of God (s.a.w.) proclaimed his wilāyah on the day of Ghadīr Khumm.’(97)

— From al-Bāqir and al-Ṣādiq (a.s.): ‘When God revealed to the Prophet (s.a.w.) that he should appoint ʿAlī as his successor, he feared that this would be hard on a group of his Companions. So God sent down this verse, as an encouragement to carry out what He had commanded him to discharge.’(98)

— From Abū al-Jārūd, from Abū Jaʿfar (a.s.):(99) he said: I heard Abū Jaʿfar (a.s.) say: ‘God, Mighty and Majestic, made five [things] obligatory on the servants. They took four and abandoned one.’ I said: ‘Will you name them for me, may I be made your ransom?’ He said: ‘The prayer. The people did not know how to pray, so Jibrīl (a.s.) came down and said: “O Muḥammad, inform them of the times of their prayers.” Then the zakāt was sent down, and he said: “O Muḥammad, inform them concerning their zakāt as you informed them concerning their prayer.” Then the fast was sent down. When it was the day of ʿĀshūrāʾ, the Messenger of God (s.a.w.) would send word to the villages around him, and they would fast that day; then the month of Ramaḍān was sent down, between Shaʿbān and Shawwāl. Then the ḥajj was sent down, and Jibrīl (a.s.) came down and said: “Inform them concerning their ḥajj as you informed them concerning their prayer, their zakāt and their fast.” Then the wilāyah was sent down. It came to him only on Friday, at ʿArafah: God, Mighty and Majestic, sent down: “Today I have perfected your religion for you, and I have completed My blessing upon you”;(100) and the perfection of the religion was through the wilāyah of ʿAlī ibn Abī Ṭālib (a.s.). At that, the Messenger of God (s.a.w.) said: “My community is fresh from the Jāhiliyyah; and when I inform them of this concerning my cousin, one will say [this] and another will say [that].” So I said [it] within myself, without my tongue uttering it. Then a decisive (batlah)(101) resolve came to me from God, Mighty and Majestic: He threatened me that, if I did not communicate, He would punish me. Then there was sent down: “O Apostle! Communicate that which has been sent down to you from your Lord, and if you do not, you will not have communicated His message, and Allah shall protect you from the people. Indeed Allah does not guide the faithless lot.” So the Messenger of God (s.a.w.) took ʿAlī (a.s.) by the hand and said: “O people, there was no prophet among the prophets who were before me but that God gave him a long life and then called him, and he answered Him. It is near that I shall be called and shall answer. I am answerable, and you are answerable; so what will you say?” They said: “We bear witness that you have communicated, given sincere counsel and discharged what was incumbent upon you; may God reward you with the best reward of the messengers.” He said: “O God, bear witness” — three times. Then he said: “O assembly of Muslims, this is your guardian (walī) after me; so let those of you who are present inform those who are absent.”’(102)

Allusions:

(a) Some Sunni exegetes have briefly referred to the ḥadīth of Ghadīr and the wilāyah of the Commander of the Faithful (a.s.) in connection with the occasion of the revelation of the noble verse.(103) Most of them, however, did not mention this ḥadīth at all; instead, they mentioned other reports that have no connection with the subject of the noble verse. Some of them cited it because it is transmitted in their narrations, and then set about raising problems and objections against it, by way of explaining [it away] and refuting [it].(104)

It is well known that the master, ʿAllāmah Ṭabāṭabāʾī (may his soul be sanctified), undertook to answer the problems raised in these exegeses,(105) just as he (may his soul be sanctified) undertook a critical discussion of the reports of the Sunni exegetes transmitted concerning this noble verse.(106)

(b) The ḥadīth of Ghadīr, ‘Of whomever I am the master, ʿAlī is his master,’(107) has come down in mutawātir ḥadīths as the occasion of the revelation of the noble verse, and it has been transmitted by more than a hundred routes, among both the Sunnis and the Shia. More than one of the Companions of the Most Noble Prophet (s.a.w.) narrated it, such as al-Barāʾ ibn ʿĀzib, Zayd ibn al-Arqam, Abū Ayyūb al-Anṣārī, ʿUmar ibn al-Khaṭṭāb, Salmān al-Fārisī, Abū Dharr al-Ghifārī, ʿAmmār ibn Yāsir, Saʿd ibn Abī Waqqāṣ, ʿAbd Allāh ibn ʿAbbās, Jābir ibn ʿAbd Allāh al-Anṣārī, Abū Saʿīd al-Khudrī, Anas ibn Mālik and others.

Beyond what has been mentioned, the infallible Imams (a.s.) were unanimous on the soundness of this ḥadīth. The Commander of the Faithful (a.s.) put the people under oath concerning it in the Raḥbah at Kufa, saying: ‘Whoever of you witnessed the Messenger of God (s.a.w.) on the day of Ghadīr Khumm, while he said what he said [let him stand].’ Thirteen men stood up and bore witness that they had heard the Messenger of God (s.a.w.) say: ‘Of whomever I am the master, ʿAlī is his master.’(108)

Note: The possibility(109) that the words “concerning ʿAlī”, or the statement “that ʿAlī is the master of the believers”, or the like, were present after His words ‘O Apostle! Communicate that which has been sent down to you from your Lord’ and were then omitted is certainly incorrect, for several reasons:

The first: had these expressions been present in the verse, no one would have been able to remove them from it in the presence of all the Muslims.

The second: had it been so, the Commander of the Faithful (a.s.) would have used them as an argument on the day of the Saqīfah and the day of the Council (al-shūrā), and the infallible Imams (a.s.) and their companions would have held fast to them. As for the words “concerning ʿAlī” and the like that occur in some reports,(110) they are only by way of exegesis and application (taṭbīq), no more; they mean that this noble verse was sent down concerning ʿAlī, the Commander of the Faithful (a.s.). The proof of this is [that there are] reports indicating the presence of other expressions in the noble verse, from which it is apparent that they are application and exegesis — this on the supposition that they are accepted. Among them is what has been narrated from them [the Imams], that it was sent down thus: ‘O Apostle! Communicate what has been sent down to you concerning ʿAlī; and if you do not, I will punish you with a painful punishment.’(111) It is very clear that the expression “I will punish you with a painful punishment” is an exegesis of ‘if you do not, you will not have communicated His message’; otherwise [it would have had to be omitted from the verse], yet no one has claimed that it was omitted from the noble verse. So, had there been a motive for omitting “concerning ʿAlī”, there would have been no motive for omitting this [expression]. This is an indication that these additions are only of the nature of application and exegesis.

There is another indication: the narration of Imam al-Ṣādiq (a.s.) concerning the absence of any mention of the name of ʿAlī (a.s.) and the names of the rest of the Ahl al-Bayt (a.s.). Abū Baṣīr narrated from Abū ʿAbd Allāh (God’s blessings be upon him) that he asked him (a.s.) about the words of God, Mighty and Majestic: ‘Obey Allah and obey the Apostle and those vested with authority among you’.(112) He said: ‘It was sent down concerning ʿAlī ibn Abī Ṭālib, al-Ḥasan and al-Ḥusayn (a.s.).’ I said to him: ‘The people say: Why then did He not name ʿAlī and the people of his house (a.s.) in the Book of God, Mighty and Majestic?’ He said: ‘Say to them: The prayer was sent down to the Messenger of God (s.a.w.), and God did not name for them three or four [rakʿahs], until it was the Messenger of God (s.a.w.) who explained that to them. The zakāt was sent down to him, and He did not name for them [that it is] one dirham out of every forty dirhams, until it was the Messenger of God (s.a.w.) who explained that to them. The ḥajj was sent down, and He did not say to them, “Go around seven times,” until it was the Messenger of God (s.a.w.) who explained that to them. And there was sent down: “Obey Allah and obey the Apostle and those vested with authority among you”, and it was sent down concerning ʿAlī, al-Ḥasan and al-Ḥusayn. So the Messenger of God (s.a.w.) said concerning ʿAlī: “Of whomever I am the master, ʿAlī is his master.”’(113)

This narration strongly indicates that what has come down specifically regarding the name of ʿAlī ibn Abī Ṭālib (a.s.) is only of the nature of applying the noble verse to his blessed name; it does not mean that his noble name was in the noble verse and was afterwards omitted.

2. The Verse of Tablīgh as an Interpretation of Wilāyah

– From Abū Jaʿfar (a.s.), who said: ‘God commanded His Messenger [to proclaim] the wilāyah of ʿAlī (a.s.), and sent down to him: ‘Your guardian is only Allah, His Apostle, and the faithful who maintain the prayer and give the zakat while bowing down’;(114) and He made obligatory the wilāyah of those vested with authority, but they did not know what it was. So God commanded Muḥammad (s.a.w.) to explain the wilāyah to them as he had explained to them the prayer, the zakāt, the fast and the ḥajj. When that came to him from God, the breast of the Messenger of God (s.a.w.) was straitened by it, and he feared that they would turn back from their religion and that they would call him a liar. So his breast was straitened, and he referred back to his Lord, Mighty and Majestic; and God, Mighty and Majestic, revealed to him: ‘O Apostle! Communicate that which has been sent down to you from your Lord, and if you do not, you will not have communicated His message, and Allah shall protect you from the people.’ So he proclaimed openly [the command of God], exalted is His mention, concerning the wilāyah of ʿAlī (a.s.) on the day of Ghadīr Khumm. He called out, “[Gather for] the congregational prayer!”, and commanded the people that the one present should convey [it] to the one absent.’(115)

– From Abū Jaʿfar al-Bāqir (a.s.), from the Messenger of God (s.a.w.), who said: ‘And He revealed to me: “In the Name of God, the All-beneficent, the All-merciful. ‘O Apostle! Communicate that which has been sent down to you from your Lord’ — concerning ʿAlī — ‘and if you do not, you will not have communicated His message, and Allah shall protect you from the people.’” O assembly of people, I have not fallen short in communicating what [God] Almighty sent down, and I am making clear to you the cause of the sending down of this verse. Jibrīl (a.s.) descended to me three times, commanding me, from [God,] the Peace, my Lord — and He is the Peace — to stand in this place of witness and make known to every white and red and black person that ʿAlī ibn Abī Ṭālib is my brother, my legatee and my successor, and he is the Imam after me, whose position in relation to me is the position of Aaron in relation to Moses, except that there is no prophet after me; and he is your guardian after God and His Messenger. God, Blessed and Exalted is He, has sent down to me concerning that a verse of His Book: ‘Your guardian is only Allah, His Apostle, and the faithful who maintain the prayer and give the zakat while bowing down’;(116) and ʿAlī ibn Abī Ṭālib is the one who maintained the prayer and gave the zakāt while bowing down, seeking God, Mighty and Majestic, in every state…’ to the end [of the narration].(117)

An allusion: No one was as acquainted with revelation as the Truthful, the Trustworthy, the Seal of the Prophets (s.a.w.), and no group was nearer to him than the People of the Household (a.s.), who knew the secrets of the revelation. All of these Infallibles (a.s.) stated explicitly that the wilāyah meant in the noble verse is the wilāyah of disposal (wilāyat al-taṣarruf) belonging to ʿAlī ibn Abī Ṭālib (a.s.), not the wilāyah of help and love.

3. The Secret of the Sending Down of the Verse of Tablīgh

– From Abū ʿAbd Allāh (a.s.), who said: ‘The Messenger of God (s.a.w.) said: “O people, preserve my words, and you will benefit from them after me; and understand them, and you will be revived by them after me. Beware! Do not turn back after me into unbelievers, some of you striking the necks of others with the sword for the sake of this world. For if you do that — and you will do it — you will find me in a squadron between Jibrīl and Mīkāʾīl, striking your faces with the sword.” Then he turned to his right and was silent for a while. Then he said: “If God wills, or ʿAlī ibn Abī Ṭālib.” Then he said: “Beware! I have left among you two things; if you hold fast to them you will never go astray: the Book of God and my kindred, the People of my Household. For the All-attentive, the All-aware has informed me that the two will never separate until they come to me at the Pool. Beware! Whoever clings to them is saved, and whoever opposes them perishes. Beware! Have I communicated?” They said: “Yes.” He said: “O God, bear witness.” Then he said: “Beware! There will come to me at the Pool men from among you who will be driven away from me. I shall say: ‘Lord, my companions!’ And it will be said: ‘O Muḥammad, they innovated after you and altered your sunnah.’ And I shall say: ‘Away with them, away with them!’”

‘When it was the last day of the days of tashrīq, God Almighty sent down: ‘When Allah’s help comes with victory’.(118) The Messenger of God (s.a.w.) said: “My own death has been announced to me.” Then he called out, “[Gather for] the congregational prayer!”, in the Mosque of al-Khayf. The people gathered, and he praised God and extolled Him. Then he said: “May God make radiant a man who heard my words, kept them in mind and conveyed them to one who has not heard them. For many a bearer of understanding (fiqh) is himself without understanding, and many a bearer of understanding [carries it] to one who has more understanding than he. There are three things over which the heart of a Muslim man does not harbour rancour: making one’s deeds sincerely for God, sincere counsel to the leaders of the Muslims, and keeping to their community; for their call encompasses those who are behind them. The believers are brothers; their blood is of equal worth; the lowest of them may extend their [pledge of] protection (dhimmah); and they are one hand against those other than them. O people, I am leaving among you the two weighty things.” They said: “O Messenger of God, and what are the two weighty things?” He said: “The Book of God and my kindred, the People of my Household. For the All-attentive, the All-aware has informed me that the two will never separate until they come to me at the Pool, like these two fingers of mine” — and he joined his two forefingers — “and I do not say like these two” — and he joined his forefinger and his middle finger — “so that this one would exceed that one.”

‘Then a group of his companions gathered and said: “Muḥammad (s.a.w.) wants to place the imāmah in the People of his Household.” So four of them went out to Mecca, entered the Kaʿbah, made a pact and bound themselves together, and wrote a document among themselves: if God caused Muḥammad to die or he was killed, they would never let this matter return to the People of his Household. Then God Almighty sent down to His Prophet concerning that: ‘Have they settled on some [devious] plan? Indeed, We too are settling [on Our plans]. Do they suppose that We do not hear their secret thoughts and their secret talks? Yes indeed [We do]! And with them are Our messengers, writing down [everything].’(119) Then the Messenger of God (s.a.w.) went out from Mecca, intending Medina, until he halted at a stopping place called Ghadīr Khumm. He had taught the people their rites and had imparted his testament to them, when this verse was sent down to him: ‘O Apostle! Communicate that which has been sent down to you from your Lord, and if you do not, you will not have communicated His message, and Allah shall protect you from the people.’ The Messenger of God (s.a.w.) stood and said: “A threat and a warning.” Then he praised God and extolled Him. Then he said: “O people, do you know who your guardian is?” They said: “Yes: God and His Messenger.” He said: “Do you not know that I have more authority over you than you have over yourselves?” They said: “Yes indeed.” He said: “O God, bear witness.” He repeated that to them three times, saying in each of them the like of his first words, and the people saying likewise, and he saying, “O God, bear witness.” Then he took the hand of the Commander of the Faithful (God’s blessings be upon him) and raised it until the white of their armpits appeared to the people. Then he (s.a.w.) said: “Beware! Whoever I am his master (mawlā), this ʿAlī is his master. O God, befriend whoever befriends him, be the enemy of whoever is his enemy, help whoever helps him, forsake whoever forsakes him, and love whoever loves him.” Then he said: “O God, bear witness against them, and I am among the witnesses.” Then ʿUmar, from among his companions, asked him to explain, and said: “O Messenger of God, is this from God or from His Messenger?” The Messenger of God (s.a.w.) said: “Yes, from God and from His Messenger. He is the Commander of the Faithful, the Imam of the Godwary and the leader of those with radiant foreheads, hands and feet (al-ghurr al-muḥajjalīn). God will seat him on the Day of Resurrection upon the Path (al-ṣirāṭ), and he will admit his friends to Paradise and his enemies to the Fire…”’ to the end [of the narration].(120)

– From Abū Jaʿfar Muḥammad ibn ʿAlī al-Bāqir, from his father, from his grandfather (a.s.), who said: ‘The Messenger of God (s.a.w.) went out one day riding, and ʿAlī (a.s.) went out walking. He said to him: “O Abū al-Ḥasan, either ride or go back; for God, Mighty and Majestic, has commanded me that you should ride when I ride, walk when I walk and sit when I sit — except where it is one of the bounds (ḥudūd) of God, in which standing and sitting are unavoidable for you. God has not honoured me with any honour but that He has honoured you with its like. He singled me out for prophethood and the mission, and He made you my guardian (walī) in that, upholding His bounds and [standing] in the hardest of His affairs. By the One who sent Muḥammad with the truth as a prophet, whoever denies you has not believed in me, whoever repudiates you has not acknowledged me, and whoever disbelieves in you has not believed in God. Your excellence is from my excellence, and my excellence for you is indeed the grace (faḍl) of God; and that is the word of my Lord, Mighty and Majestic: ‘Say, “In Allah’s grace and His mercy—let them rejoice in that! It is better than what they amass”’.(121) The grace of God is the prophethood of your Prophet, and His mercy is the wilāyah of ʿAlī ibn Abī Ṭālib. ‘In that’ — he said: in prophethood and wilāyah — ‘let them rejoice’, meaning the Shia; ‘It is better than what they amass’, meaning [than what] their opponents [amass] of family, wealth and children in the abode of this world. By God, O ʿAlī, you were created only so that your Lord may be worshipped, that through you the landmarks of the religion may be known, and that through you the effaced road may be set right. Whoever has strayed from you has gone astray, and whoever is not guided to you and to your wilāyah will never be guided to God, Mighty and Majestic; and that is the word of my Lord, Mighty and Majestic: ‘Indeed I forgive those who repent, become faithful, act righteously, and follow guidance’(122) — meaning [guidance] to your wilāyah. My Lord, Blessed and Exalted is He, has commanded me to make obligatory regarding your right what I make obligatory regarding my own right. Your right is indeed obligatory upon whoever has believed in me. Were it not for you, the party of God would not be known, and through you the enemy of God is known. Whoever does not meet Him with your wilāyah does not meet Him with anything. God, Mighty and Majestic, has sent down to me: ‘O Apostle! Communicate that which has been sent down to you from your Lord’ — meaning concerning your wilāyah, O ʿAlī — ‘and if you do not, you will not have communicated His message’. Had I not communicated what I was commanded concerning your wilāyah, my deeds would have come to nothing; and whoever meets God, Mighty and Majestic, without your wilāyah, his deeds have come to nothing — a promise that will be fulfilled for me. I say nothing but the word of my Lord, Blessed and Exalted is He; and what I say is indeed from God, Mighty and Majestic, who sent it down concerning you.”’(123)

An allusion: Were anything the equal (ʿidl) of the Noble Qurʾān, it would necessarily have to be heavenly, and it would necessarily have to be by appointment (naṣb), certainly not by choice, just as the condition stipulated for it is that it be from God (s.w.t.), not from the people.

4. The Miracle Confirming the Verse concerning ʿAlī (a.s.) at Ghadīr Khumm

– From Jaʿfar ibn Muḥammad al-Ṣādiq, from his fathers (a.s.), who said: ‘When the Messenger of God (s.a.w.) appointed ʿAlī on the day of Ghadīr Khumm and said, “Whoever I am his master (mawlā), ʿAlī is his master”, that flew through the lands. Al-Nuʿmān ibn al-Ḥārith al-Zuhrī(124) came to the Prophet (s.a.w.) and said: “You commanded us, from God, to bear witness that there is no god but God and that you are the Messenger of God; you commanded us [to perform] jihād, the ḥajj, the fast, the prayer and the zakāt, and we accepted them. Then you were not satisfied until you appointed this youth and said, ‘Whoever I am his master, ʿAlī is his master.’ Is this something from you, or a command from God?” He said: “No, by God, besides whom there is no god, this is from God.” Al-Nuʿmān ibn al-Ḥārith turned away, saying: ‘O Allah, if this be the truth from You, rain down upon us stones from the sky’.(125) God struck him with a stone on his head and killed him, and God Almighty sent down: ‘An asker asked for a punishment sure to befall’.’(126)(127)

An allusion: Once the chain of transmission has been established as sound and free from dispute, and once it is accepted that Sūrat al-Maʿārij is Medinan, or that a Medinan verse was placed in a Meccan sūrah, then, as regards punishment descending in the presence of the Messenger of God (s.a.w.), it may be said that His words ‘But Allah will not punish them while you are in their midst, nor will Allah punish them while they plead for forgiveness’(128) concern the punishment of extermination and general chastisement, and so do not conflict with particular chastisement.

5. A Summary of the Ḥadīth of Ghadīr Khumm

From Abū Jaʿfar al-Bāqir (a.s.): He said: The Messenger of God (s.a.w.) performed the ḥajj from Medina, having communicated all the laws (sharāʾiʿ) to his people except the ḥajj and the wilāyah. Then Jibrīl (a.s.) came to him and said to him: ‘O Muḥammad, God, Mighty and Majestic, sends you greetings of peace and says to you: I have not taken [the soul of] any prophet of My prophets or any messenger of My messengers except after the perfection of My religion and the confirmation of My proof. Of that there remain for you two obligations which you must communicate to your people: the obligation of the ḥajj, and the obligation of the wilāyah and the succession after you. For I have not left the earth empty of My proof, and I shall never leave it empty. God commands you to communicate the ḥajj to your people: you are to perform the ḥajj, and everyone able to make the journey — of the settled people, the people of the outlying regions and the Bedouins — is to perform the ḥajj with you; you are to teach them their ḥajj just as you taught them their prayer, their zakāt and their fasting, and to instruct them in it after the pattern by which you instructed them in all the laws you communicated to them.’ So the herald of the Messenger of God (s.a.w.) called out among the people: ‘Behold! The Messenger of God (s.a.w.) intends the ḥajj, and to teach you of it the like of what he has taught you of the laws of your religion, and to instruct you in it as he has instructed you [in them].’ The Messenger of God (s.a.w.) set out, and the people set out with him, giving him their attention so as to see what he would do and do the like of it. He performed the ḥajj with them, and those of the people of Medina, of the outlying regions and of the Bedouins who performed the ḥajj with the Messenger of God (s.a.w.) reached seventy thousand persons or more — around the number of the companions of Moses, the seventy thousand from whom he took the oath of allegiance to Aaron (a.s.), and who broke it and followed the Calf and al-Sāmirī. In the same way the Messenger of God (s.a.w.) took the oath of allegiance for ʿAlī (a.s.) to the succession — to the number of the companions of Moses — and they broke the oath of allegiance and followed the Calf and al-Sāmirī: a practice for a practice (sunnatan bi-sunnah), and a like for a like. The talbiyah continued unbroken between Mecca and Medina. When he halted at the Standing-place (al-mawqif), Jibrīl (a.s.) came to him and said: ‘O Muḥammad, God, Mighty and Majestic, sends you greetings of peace and says to you: Your term and your span have drawn near, and I am bringing you forward to that which cannot be avoided and from which there is no escape. So make your pledge (ʿahd), put forward your will, and turn to what you have of knowledge and the inheritance of the knowledge of the prophets before you, the weapon, the Ark, and all that you have of the signs of the prophets before you, and hand them over to your legatee and your successor after you, My conclusive proof over My creation, ʿAlī ibn Abī Ṭālib. Set him up for the people, and take his pledge, his covenant and the oath of allegiance to him; and remind them of the oath of allegiance to Me which I took from them, and My covenant by which I bound them, and My pledge which I enjoined upon them, concerning the wilāyah of My walī, their master (mawlā) and the master of every believing man and believing woman, ʿAlī ibn Abī Ṭālib. For I have not taken [the soul of] any prophet of My prophets except after the perfection of My proof and My religion, and the completion of My blessing through the wilāyah of My friends (awliyāʾ) and enmity towards My enemies; and that is the perfection of My tawḥīd and My religion, and the completion of My blessing upon My creation through the following of My walī and obedience to him. That is because I do not leave My earth without a custodian (qayyim), so that he may be a proof over My creation. So: ‘Today I have perfected your religion for you, and I have completed My blessing upon you, and I have approved Islam as your religion’.(129) ʿAlī is My walī and the master of every believing man and believing woman; ʿAlī is My servant, the legatee of My Prophet and the successor after him, and My conclusive proof over My creation. Obedience to him is joined with obedience to Muḥammad, My Prophet, and obedience to Muḥammad is joined with obedience to Me. Whoever obeys him has obeyed Me, and whoever disobeys him has disobeyed Me. I have made him a sign (ʿalam) between Me and My creation: whoever knows him is a believer, whoever denies him is an unbeliever, and whoever associates [another] in the oath of allegiance to him is a polytheist; whoever meets Me with his wilāyah enters Paradise, and whoever meets Me with enmity towards him enters the Fire. So, O Muḥammad, set up ʿAlī as a sign, take the oath of allegiance from them, and take for them My pledge and My covenant by which I bound them; for I am taking you to Myself and bringing you forward.’

The Messenger of God (s.a.w.) feared [for the reaction of] his people and of the people of hypocrisy and discord, lest they split apart and return to the [ways of the] Jāhiliyyah, because of what he knew of their enmity and of the hatred towards ʿAlī (a.s.) which their souls harboured. He asked Jibrīl (a.s.) to ask his Lord for protection (ʿiṣmah) from the people, and waited for Jibrīl to bring him the protection from the people from God, Mighty and Majestic. So he put that off until he reached the Mosque of al-Khayf. Jibrīl (a.s.) came to him and commanded him to make his pledge and to set up ʿAlī as his proof for the people, but did not bring him the protection from God, Mighty and Majestic, that he wanted; until he reached Kurāʿ al-Ghamīm, between Mecca and Medina. Jibrīl came to him and commanded him with what he had commanded him before, but did not bring him the protection. He said: ‘O Jibrīl, I fear that my people will call me a liar and will not accept what I say concerning ʿAlī.’ Then he moved on. When he reached Ghadīr Khumm, three miles before al-Juḥfah, Jibrīl (a.s.) came to him, when five hours of the day had passed, with rebuke and reproof, and with the protection from the people, and said: ‘O Muḥammad, God, Mighty and Majestic, sends you greetings of peace and says to you: ‘O Apostle! Communicate that which has been sent down to you from your Lord’ concerning ʿAlī — ‘and if you do not, you will not have communicated His message, and Allah shall protect you from the people’.’ The first of them had reached near al-Juḥfah; so he commanded him to bring back those of them who had gone ahead and to hold back in that place those who had lagged behind, so that he might set up ʿAlī (a.s.) for the people and communicate to them what God, Mighty and Majestic, had sent down concerning ʿAlī (a.s.); and he informed him that God Almighty had protected him from the people. When the protection came to him, the Messenger of God (s.a.w.) commanded a herald to call out, and he called out among the people [summoning them] to the congregational prayer (al-ṣalātu jāmiʿah). He turned aside from the right of the road to the side of the Mosque of al-Ghadīr — Jibrīl (a.s.) had commanded him to do so from God Almighty. In that place there were salam trees, and the Messenger of God (s.a.w.) ordered that what was beneath them be swept, and that stones be set up for him in the form of a pulpit, so that he might look down over the people. The people came back, and the last of them were held in that place, not moving on. The Messenger of God (s.a.w.) stood upon those stones and said:

‘Praise belongs to God, who is exalted in His unity and near in His uniqueness, majestic in His authority and mighty in His pillars; who encompasses all things in knowledge while He is in His place, and subdues all creation by His power and His proof. Praiseworthy, He has ever been praised, and He ever remains glorious; He does not cease to be the Originator and the Restorer, and to Him every matter returns. The Maker of the raised [heavens] (al-masmūkāt) and the Spreader of the spread-out [earths] (al-madḥuwwāt); All-holy, All-glorified, Lord of the angels and the Spirit; bountiful to all whom He has made, gracious to all whom He has brought forth. He observes every eye, while the eyes do not see Him. Generous, Merciful, Forbearing; His mercy encompasses all things, and He has favoured all His creation with His blessing. He does not hasten His vengeance, nor does He rush upon them with the punishment they have deserved. He understands the secrets and knows the consciences; hidden things are not concealed from Him, nor are obscure things unclear to Him. His is the encompassing of all things, dominance over all things, strength in all things and power over all things. Nothing is like Him; He is the One who brings the thing into being when there was no thing and when there was no living being; Maintainer of justice; there is no god except Him, the All-mighty, the All-wise. He is too majestic for the sight to perceive Him, while He perceives the sight, and He is the All-attentive, the All-aware. No one attains to describing Him by beholding [Him], nor is He bounded — how [could He be], when He is of the secret and not of the open? — except through that by which He, Mighty and Majestic, has pointed to Himself.(130) I bear witness for Him that He is God, there is no god except Him; whose holiness has outworn time, and whose light outlasts eternity;(131) who executes His command without consulting any counsellor; nor has He any partner with Him in determining (taqdīr), nor is there any disparity in [His] managing (tadbīr). He formed what He originated without a model, and created what He created without help from anyone, without exertion and without contrivance. He brought them into being and they came to be; He made them and they became distinct. He is God, there is no god except Him, of perfect workmanship and excellent making; the Just who does not wrong, and the Most Generous to whom [all] matters return.

‘And I bear witness that He is God, before whose greatness all things are humbled, before whose might all things are abased, to whose power all things submit, and before whose awe all things are lowly: Master of the kingdoms, Subjugator of the sun and the moon in the spheres — each running for a specified term; He winds the night over the day and winds the day over the night, pursuing it swiftly; Breaker of every obstinate tyrant and Destroyer of every rebellious devil. He has no opposite, and no peer with Him; One, the Self-sufficient (ṣamad); He does not beget, nor was He begotten, nor has He any equal; One God and Glorious Lord. He wills and it is carried out; He intends and decrees; He knows and takes account; He makes to die and gives life; He makes poor and makes rich; He makes to laugh and makes to weep; He brings near and sends far; He withholds and gives. His is the kingdom and His is the praise; in His hand is good, and He has power over all things. He makes the night pass into the day and makes the day pass into the night; there is no god except Him, the All-mighty, the All-forgiving; Answerer of supplication, Abundant in giving, Reckoner of breaths, Lord of the jinn and mankind; whom no language confuses, whom the cries of those calling for help do not weary, and whom the insistence of the importunate does not vex; Protector of the righteous, Giver of success to the Godwary, Master of the believers, Lord of all the worlds; who is entitled, from every creature, to be thanked and praised by it in every state. I praise Him and thank Him in ease and in adversity, in hardship and in prosperity; and I believe in Him, His angels, His Books and His messengers. So hear and obey His command, hasten to what pleases Him, and submit to His decree, out of desire for obedience to Him and fear of His punishment; for He is God, whose plan none can feel safe from and whose injustice none need fear. I acknowledge to Him servanthood for myself, and I bear witness to Him of Lordship; and I discharge what He has revealed to me, out of fear and wariness lest a calamity befall me which no one could avert from me, however great his favour and however sincere his friendship; for He — there is no god except Him — has made known to me that if I do not communicate what He has sent down to me, I shall not have communicated His message; and He has guaranteed me protection — and He is God, the Sufficient, the Generous. He has revealed to me: In the Name of Allah, the All-beneficent, the All-merciful. ‘O Apostle! Communicate that which has been sent down to you from your Lord’ concerning ʿAlī — ‘and if you do not, you will not have communicated His message, and Allah shall protect you from the people’.

‘O people, I have not fallen short in communicating what God Almighty has sent down, and I am explaining to you the cause of the sending down of this verse. Jibrīl (a.s.) came down to me three times, commanding me, from the Peace (al-Salām), my Lord — and He is the Peace — to stand in this place of assembly (mashhad) and make known to every white, red and black [person] that ʿAlī ibn Abī Ṭālib is my brother, my legatee and my successor, and that he is the Imam after me, whose position in relation to me is that of Aaron in relation to Moses, except that there is no prophet after me; and he is your guardian (walī) after God and His Messenger. God, Blessed and Exalted is He, has sent down to me concerning that a verse of His Book: ‘Your guardian is only Allah, His Apostle, and the faithful who maintain the prayer and give the zakat while bowing down’;(132) and ʿAlī ibn Abī Ṭālib is the one who maintained the prayer and gave the zakāt while bowing, seeking God, Mighty and Majestic, in every state. I asked Jibrīl (a.s.) to ask [God] to excuse me from communicating that to you — O people — because of my knowledge of how few are the Godwary and how many are the hypocrites, of the deceits of the sinful and the wiles of the mockers, whom God has described in His Book as those who ‘say with their tongues what is not in their hearts’,(133) and who suppose it to be a light matter while it is grave with God; and because of their frequent harming of me, more than once, to the point that they called me “an ear” and claimed that it was so, because of how constantly I kept his company and how much I turned towards him; until God sent down concerning that: ‘those who torment the Prophet, and say, “He is an ear”’;(134) and He said: ‘Say, “An ear”’(135) — against those who claim that he is “an ear” — ‘that is good for you’,(136) to the end of the verse. Had I wished to name those who say this by their names, I would have named them, and pointed them out in person; and had I wished to point you to them, I would have done so. But in their affair I have acted with generosity. And with all that, God will not be pleased with me unless I communicate what He has sent down to me. For He said: ‘O Apostle! Communicate that which has been sent down to you from your Lord’ concerning ʿAlī — ‘and if you do not, you will not have communicated His message, and Allah shall protect you from the people’, to the end of the verse.

‘So know — O people — and understand it; and know that God has set him up for you as guardian and Imam, obedience to whom is made obligatory upon the Emigrants (Muhājirūn) and the Helpers (Anṣār), and upon those who follow them in excellence, and upon the desert-dweller and the town-dweller, the non-Arab and the Arab, the free and the slave, the young and the old, the white and the black, and upon every monotheist. His judgement is carried out, his word is valid, his command is effective; cursed is whoever opposes him, shown mercy is whoever follows him, a believer is whoever affirms him. God has forgiven whoever hears him and obeys him. O people, this is the last standing I shall stand in this place of assembly; so hear and obey, and submit to the command of your Lord. For God, Mighty and Majestic, is your Master (mawlā) and your God; then, below Him, His Messenger Muḥammad, your guardian, who stands addressing you; then after me ʿAlī is your guardian and your Imam, by the command of God your Lord; then the imāmah is in those from his loins, until the day they meet God and His Messenger. There is nothing lawful except what God has made lawful, and nothing unlawful except what God has made unlawful. God has made known to me the lawful and the unlawful, and I have handed on to him what my Lord taught me of His Book and of what it makes lawful and unlawful. O people, there is no knowledge but that God has comprehended it in me, and every knowledge I have learned I have comprehended in the Imam of the Godwary; there is no knowledge but that I have taught it to ʿAlī, and he is the manifest Imam (al-imām al-mubīn). O people, do not stray from him, do not shun him, and do not disdain his wilāyah; for he is the one who guides to the truth and acts by it, who vanquishes falsehood and forbids it, and whom, in [the cause of] God, the blame of no blamer takes hold of. Moreover, he is the first to have believed in God and His Messenger; the one who ransomed the Messenger of God with his own self; and the one who was with the Messenger of God when no one among men but he worshipped God with His Messenger. O people, give him preference, for God has given him preference; and accept him, for God has set him up. O people, he is an Imam from God; and God will never turn [in forgiveness] to anyone who denies his wilāyah, nor will He ever forgive him. It is binding upon God to do that to whoever opposes His command concerning him, and to punish him with a terrible punishment for ever and ever, to the end of all time. So beware of opposing me, lest you enter a fire whose fuel is people and stones, prepared for the unbelievers. O people, through me — by God — the first of the prophets and the messengers gave glad tidings, and I am the Seal of the prophets and the messengers, and the proof over all created beings among the people of the heavens and the earths. Whoever doubts that is an unbeliever, with the unbelief of the first Jāhiliyyah; and whoever doubts this saying of mine has doubted all of it; and doubt concerning that — it is in the Fire.(137) O people, God has bestowed this excellence upon me as a favour from Him to me and a kindness from Him to me — and there is no god except Him; His is the praise from me for ever and ever, to the end of all time, in every state. O people, give ʿAlī preference, for he is the most excellent of people after me, of male and female. Through us God has sent down provision, and creation has endured. Cursed, cursed, the object of wrath, the object of wrath, is whoever rejects this saying of mine. Behold! Jibrīl informed me of that from God, and he says: “Whoever is hostile to ʿAlī and does not take him as guardian, upon him is My curse and My wrath.” So let every soul consider what it has sent ahead for tomorrow; and be wary of God lest you oppose [him] and a foot slip after being firm; indeed God is aware of what you do. O people, contemplate the Qurʾān and understand its verses and its definitive [verses], and do not follow its metaphorical [verses]; for, by God, its restraining injunctions will never be made clear to you, nor its interpretation made plain to you, except by the one whose hand I am taking, whom I am raising up to me and lifting by his upper arm, and [about whom I am] informing you that of whomever I am the master (mawlā), this ʿAlī is his master. He is ʿAlī ibn Abī Ṭālib, my brother and my legatee, and [the duty of] befriending him (muwālātuhu) is from God Almighty, who sent it down to me. O people, he is the “side of God” (janb Allāh) which He mentioned in His Book: ‘Alas for my negligence in the vicinage of Allah!’(138) O people, ʿAlī and the pure ones of my offspring are the lesser weighty thing (al-thaqal al-aṣghar), and the Qurʾān is the greater weighty thing (al-thaqal al-akbar); each of them gives news of the other and accords with it; they will never separate until they come to me at the Pool. [They are] God’s trustees among His creation and His judges in His earth. Behold! God, Mighty and Majestic, has said [it], and I have said it on behalf of God, Mighty and Majestic. Behold! I have discharged [it]; behold! I have communicated; behold! I have made [you] hear; behold! I have made it clear. Behold! There is no Commander of the Faithful other than this brother of mine, and command over the faithful (imrat al-muʾminīn) is lawful after me for no one but him.’

Then he struck with his hand on ʿAlī’s upper arm and raised him up. The Commander of the Faithful (a.s.), from when the Messenger of God (s.a.w.) first ascended, had lifted ʿAlī (a.s.) until his feet were level with the knee of the Messenger of God (God’s blessings be upon them both).(139) Then he said: ‘O people, this is ʿAlī, my brother and my legatee, the vessel of my knowledge, and my successor over my community and over the interpretation of the Book of God, Mighty and Majestic; the one who calls to Him, who acts by what pleases Him, who wages war on His enemies, who befriends [people] in obedience to Him, and who forbids disobedience to Him; the successor of the Messenger of God, the Commander of the Faithful, and the guiding Imam, by the command of God; and the fighter of those who break their oath of allegiance (al-nākithīn), of those who deviate [from the truth] (al-qāsiṭīn) and of those who swerve out [of the religion] (al-māriqīn), by the command of God. I say: the word is not changed with me, by the command of my Lord. I say: O God, befriend whoever befriends him, be hostile to whoever is hostile to him, curse whoever denies him and rejects his right, and be wrathful against whoever rejects him. O God, You sent down the imāmah for ʿAlī, Your walī, at the making clear of that, through Your preferring him by what You perfected for Your servants of their religion, completed of Your blessing upon them, and approved of Islam as their religion; and You said: ‘Should anyone follow a religion other than Islam, it shall never be accepted from him, and he will be among the losers in the Hereafter’.(140) O God, I call You to witness that I have communicated.

‘O people, God, Mighty and Majestic, has perfected your religion only through his imāmah. So whoever does not follow him, and those of my offspring from his loins who will come until the Day of Resurrection and the Presentation before God Almighty — ‘Their works have failed, and they shall remain in the Fire [forever]’;(141) ‘their punishment will not be lightened, nor will they be granted any respite’.(142) O people, this is ʿAlī, the most helpful of you to me, the most entitled of people to me, the nearest of you to me and the dearest of you to me; God, Mighty and Majestic, and I are pleased with him. No verse of [divine] good pleasure was sent down except concerning him; God never addressed those who have faith without beginning with him; no verse of praise in the Qurʾān was sent down except concerning him; and in ‘Has there been [a period of time] for man …’(143) God bore witness to Paradise for no one but him, nor did He send it down concerning anyone else, nor praise anyone else by it. O people, he is the helper of the religion of God and the one who disputes on behalf of God; he is the Godwary, the pure, the guide, the rightly guided. Your Prophet is the best of prophets, your legatee is the best of legatees, and his sons are the best of legatees. O people, the offspring of every prophet is from his own loins, while my offspring is from the loins of ʿAlī. O people, Iblīs brought Adam out of the Garden through envy; so do not envy him, lest your works fail and your feet slip. For Adam (a.s.) was sent down to the earth for a single error, though he was the chosen one of God Almighty; so how will it be with you if you slip — and you are [but] servants of God! None hates ʿAlī except the wretched, none takes ʿAlī as guardian except the Godwary, and none believes in him except the sincere believer. Concerning ʿAlī — by God — Sūrat al-ʿAṣr was sent down: In the Name of Allah, the All-beneficent, the All-merciful. ‘By Time! Man is indeed in loss, except those who have faith and do righteous deeds, and enjoin one another to [follow] the truth, and enjoin one another to patience’.(144) O people, I have called God to witness and have communicated the message to you; ‘and the Apostle’s duty is only to communicate in clear terms’.(145) O people, ‘Be wary of Allah with the wariness due to Him and do not die except as Muslims’.(146) O people, believe in God and His Messenger and the light that was sent down with him, ‘before We blot out the faces and turn them backwards’.(147) O people, the light from God, Mighty and Majestic, runs in me, then in ʿAlī, then in the progeny from him, until the Qāʾim, the Mahdī, who will take [back] the right of God and the right of every believer. For God, Mighty and Majestic, has made us a proof against those who fall short, the obstinate, the opposers, the treacherous, the sinful and the wrongdoers among all the worlds. O people, I am the Messenger of God; messengers have passed away before me. If I die or am slain, will you turn back on your heels? Whoever turns back on his heels will not harm God in the least, and God will reward the grateful, the patient. Behold! ʿAlī is the one described by patience and gratitude, then after him my offspring from his loins. O people, do not count your Islam as a favour to me, lest God be angry with you and afflict you with a punishment from Him; indeed your Lord is in ambush. O people, after me there will be imams who invite to the Fire, and on the Day of Resurrection they will not be helped. O people, God and I are quit of them. O people, they, their helpers, their partisans and their followers are in the lowest reach of the Fire; and evil indeed is the abode of the arrogant. O people, I leave it as an imāmah and an inheritance in my posterity until the Day of Resurrection; and I have communicated what I have communicated as a proof against everyone present and absent, and against everyone who has witnessed or not witnessed, who has been born or not been born. So let the one present convey it to the one absent, and the parent to the child, until the Day of Resurrection. They will make it a kingship and a usurpation. Behold! May God curse the usurpers and the seizers! And at that: ‘Soon We shall make Ourselves unoccupied for you, O you notable two!’(148) ‘There will be unleashed upon you a flash of fire and a smoke; then you will not be able to help one another’.(149)

‘O people, God, Mighty and Majestic, was not one to leave you in the state you are in until He separates the bad from the good; ‘Allah will not acquaint you with the Unseen’.(150) O people, there is no township but that God will destroy it for its denial [of the truth]; and thus He destroys the townships while they are wrongdoing, as God, Mighty and Majestic, has mentioned. This is your Imam and your guardian, and he is the [object of the] promises of God; and God makes good His promise. O people, most of the former [peoples] went astray before you; God destroyed the former ones, and He is the destroyer of the later ones. God Almighty has said: ‘Did We not destroy the former generations, [and] then made the latter ones follow them? That is how We deal with the guilty. Woe to the deniers on that day!’(151) O people, God has given me command and prohibition, and I have given ʿAlī command and prohibition; and he has learned the command and the prohibition from his Lord, Mighty and Majestic. So hear his command and obey it, desist at his prohibition, and go along with what he wants; and do not let the [other] ways separate you from His way. I am the straight path of God, which He has commanded you to follow; then ʿAlī after me; then my offspring from his loins, imams who guide by the truth and by it act justly.’ Then he (s.a.w.) recited ‘All praise belongs to Allah’(152) to its end, and said: ‘It was sent down concerning me, and it was sent down concerning them; it comprehends them, and it singles them out. They are the friends of God (awliyāʾ Allāh), upon whom there will be no fear, nor will they grieve. Behold! The party of God — they are the victors. Behold! Their enemies are the people of discord, the opposers [of God], the transgressors, and the brethren of the devils, who ‘inspire each other with flashy words, deceptively’.(153) … O people, say what I have said to you, and greet ʿAlī as Commander of the Faithful (bi-imrat al-muʾminīn), and say: ‘We hear and obey. Our Lord, forgive us, and toward You is the return’.’ The people called out to him: ‘Yes, we have heard, and we obey what God and His Messenger have commanded, with our hearts, our tongues and our hands.’ They crowded around the Messenger of God (s.a.w.) and ʿAlī (a.s.) and clasped hands [with them in allegiance]. The first to clasp hands with the Messenger of God (s.a.w.) were the first, the second, the third, the fourth and the fifth, and the rest of the Emigrants and the Helpers, and the rest of the people according to their ranks, until the evening prayer (al-ʿishāʾ) and the night prayer (al-ʿatamah) were prayed at one time. They kept up the oath of allegiance and the clasping of hands for three [days], and the Messenger of God (s.a.w.), whenever a group pledged allegiance, would say: ‘Praise belongs to God, Lord of all the worlds; praise belongs to God, who has preferred us over all the worlds.’(154)

Allusions:

(a) This ḥadīth contains the following important points:

The first point: The effect that the hypocrisy and rancour of the hypocrites had on the deliberate delay (tarayyuth) of the Most Noble Prophet (s.a.w.), and the fact that this [delay] was praiseworthy and commendable.

The second point: Regard for the rights of the people, among them the right to be informed about their future ruler.

(b) This ḥadīth has set out how the Qurʾān is interpreted by the Qurʾān: it reads the verse ‘The Prophet is closer to the faithful than their own souls, and his wives are their mothers. The blood relatives are more entitled to inherit from one another in the Book of Allah than the [other] faithful and Emigrants, barring any favour you may do your comrades. This has been written in the Book’(155)(156) in interpreting His words ‘Your guardian is only Allah, His Apostle, and the faithful who maintain the prayer and give the zakat while bowing down’,(157) and in explaining the words of God (s.w.t.): ‘O Apostle! Communicate that which has been sent down to you from your Lord, and if you do not, you will not have communicated His message, and Allah shall protect you from the people. Indeed Allah does not guide the faithless lot’. It has emphasised that the verse of the wilāyah of the Commander of the Faithful (a.s.) and the verse of Sūrat al-Aḥzāb must be one in meaning, rather than [the former] being interpreted in the sense of the believers’ befriending one another and the like — [verses] in which wilāyah means the wilāyah of help and love.

References

1. See Tasnīm fī Tafsīr al-Qurʾān, vol. 13, p. 470, “al-balāgh”; vol. 15, pp. 216–218, “yaʿtaṣim”.

2. Sūrat al-Baqarah, verse 21 and verse 168; Sūrat al-Nisāʾ, verse 1 and verse 174.

3. Sūrat al-Māʾidah, verse 15, verse 59 and verse 77.

4. Sūrat al-Nisāʾ, verse 136.

5. Sūrat al-Shuʿarāʾ, verse 116.

6. [Translator: in Sūrat al-Shuʿarāʾ, verse 116, the words “O Noah” are spoken by Noah’s people (Qarai: ‘They said, “Noah, if you do not desist, you will certainly be stoned [to death]”’), not by God; God’s own address ‘O Noah’ occurs, for example, in Sūrat Hūd, verses 46 and 48.]

7. Sūrat al-Baqarah, verse 35; Sūrat Ṭā Hā, verse 117.

8. Sūrat Hūd, verse 76; Sūrat al-Ṣāffāt, verse 104.

9. Sūrat Ṣād, verse 26.

10. Sūrat al-Anfāl, verse 64 and verse 65; Sūrat al-Tawbah, verse 73.

11. Sūrat al-Nūr, verse 63.

12. Sūrat al-Anfāl, verse 64 and verse 65; Sūrat al-Tawbah, verse 73.

13. See Raḥmah min al-Raḥmān, vol. 2, p. 35.

14. Sūrat al-Kahf, verses 83–84.

15. Sūrat al-Kahf, verses 66–67.

16. Sūrat al-Kahf, verses 71–72.

17. Sūrat al-Kahf, verses 65–82.

18. Sūrat al-Isrāʾ, verse 85.

19. Sūrat al-Māʾidah, verse 3.

20. Sūrat al-Māʾidah, verse 3.

21. Sūrat al-Māʾidah, verse 3.

22. Majmaʿ al-Bayān, vols. 3–4, p. 231.

23. Sūrat al-Baqarah, verses 219–220.

24. Sūrat al-Ṣāffāt, verses 151–152.

25. Sūrat al-Māʾidah, verse 66.

26. Sūrat al-Māʾidah, verse 68.

27. See al-Mīzān, vol. 6, pp. 42–43.

28. See al-Tafsīr al-Kabīr, vol. 12, p. 51; Jāmiʿ al-Bayān, vol. 6, p. 395.

29. Al-Tafsīr al-Kabīr, vol. 12, pp. 52–53.

30. Sūrat al-Māʾidah, verse 51.

31. Sūrat al-Baqarah, verse 65.

32. Sūrat al-Nisāʾ, verse 47.

33. Sūrat al-Baqarah, verse 61.

34. Sūrat al-Qiyāmah, verses 16–17.

35. Sūrat al-Najm, verses 3–4.

36. Sūrat al-Takwīr, verse 24.

37. [Translator: the square brackets around this clause are printed in the Arabic.]

38. Sūrat al-Naṣr, verse 1.

39. Sūrat al-Munāfiqūn, verse 7.

40. Al-Maghāzī, vol. 2, p. 828.

41. Sūrat al-Ḥijr, verses 94–95.

42. Sūrat al-Nisāʾ, verse 84.

43. Nahj al-Balāghah, Gharāʾib Kalāmihi [the rare sayings], 9.

44. Sūrat al-Aḥzāb, verse 39.

45. Tafsīr al-Mīzān, vol. 6, p. 43.

46. See Tafsīr al-Manār, vol. 6, p. 383.

47. Sūrat al-Maʿārij, verses 1–2.

48. It has been reported concerning the occasion of the revelation of this verse that it was sent down after the Most Noble Prophet (s.a.w.) proclaimed the wilāyah of ʿAlī ibn Abī Ṭālib (a.s.) at Ghadīr Khumm. Al-Thaʿlabī and others said, in these words: ‘My father narrated to me from Jaʿfar ibn Muḥammad, from his forefathers. He said: When the Messenger of God (s.a.w.) was at Ghadīr Khumm, he called the people and they gathered. He took ʿAlī (a.s.) by the hand and said: “Of whomever I am the master (mawlā), ʿAlī is his master.” This spread and flew through the lands, and it reached al-Ḥarth [al-Ḥārith] ibn al-Nuʿmān al-Qahrī [al-Fihrī].(49) He came to the Messenger of God (s.a.w.) on a she-camel of his until he reached al-Abṭaḥ. He dismounted from his camel, made it kneel and hobbled it; then he came to the Prophet (s.a.w.), who was among a company of his Companions, and said: “O Muḥammad, you commanded us from God to bear witness that there is no god but God and that you are the Messenger of God, and we accepted it from you; you commanded us to pray five [times], and we accepted it from you; you commanded us [to pay] the zakāt, and we accepted it; you commanded us [to perform] the ḥajj, and we accepted it; you commanded us to fast a month, and we accepted it. Then you were not content with this until you raised your cousin by his upper arms and preferred him over us, and said: ‘Of whomever I am the master, ʿAlī is his master.’ Is this something from you or from God Almighty?” He said: “By the One besides whom there is no god, this is from God.” So al-Ḥarth [al-Ḥārith] ibn al-Nuʿmān turned away, making for his mount and saying: “O God, if what he says is true, ‘rain down upon us stones from the sky, or bring us a painful punishment’” (Sūrat al-Anfāl, verse 32). He had not reached it before God struck him with a stone, which fell on the crown of his head and came out of his rear, and killed him; and God, Glorified is He, sent down: “An asker asked for a punishment sure to befall —which none can avert from the faithless —”.’ (Al-Kashf wa-l-Bayān, vol. 10, p. 35; Musnad Aḥmad ibn Ḥanbal, vol. 1, p. 84; vol. 5, p. 347.)

49. [Translator: the bracketed corrections of the names (“al-Ḥārith”, “al-Fihrī”) are printed in the Arabic, after the forms “al-Ḥarth” and “al-Qahrī”.]

50. They said that verse 32 of Sūrat al-Anfāl is a verse of a Medinan sūrah sent down years before Sūrat al-Māʾidah, and that it refers to what some of the hypocrites said to the Most Noble Prophet (s.a.w.) before the Hijrah; so it cannot be said that the verse in Sūrat al-Anfāl refers to the story of al-Ḥārith ibn al-Nuʿmān, which was sent down years later. (See Tafsīr al-Manār, vol. 6, p. 383.) It has also been said that the one concerning whom this verse was sent down is al-Nuʿmān ibn al-Ḥārith; this will be mentioned in the Discussion of the Narrations, God Almighty willing.

51. See Tafsīr al-Manār, vol. 6, p. 383.

52. See Tafsīr al-Taḥrīr wa-l-Tanwīr, vol. 29, p. 141.

53. Sūrat al-Baqarah, verse 65.

54. Sūrat al-Nisāʾ, verse 47.

55. Sūrat al-Baqarah, verse 61.

56. Such as His words: ‘There is a sickness in their hearts; then Allah increased their sickness, and there is a painful punishment for them because of the lies they used to tell’ (Sūrat al-Baqarah, verse 10); His words (s.w.t.): ‘Indeed Allah will gather the hypocrites and the faithless in hell all together’ (Sūrat al-Nisāʾ, verse 140); and His words (s.w.t.): ‘Indeed the hypocrites will be in the lowest reach of the Fire, and you will never find any helper for them’ (Sūrat al-Nisāʾ, verse 145).

57. Sūrat al-Baqarah, verse 14.

58. Sūrat al-Māʾidah, verse 32.

59. Al-Kashshāf, al-Zamakhsharī, vol. 1, p. 659.

60. Al-Tafsīr al-Kabīr, vol. 12, p. 52.

61. Tafsīr al-Mīzān, vol. 6, pp. 45–46.

62. Ṣaḥīḥ al-Bukhārī, vol. 5, p. 138.

63. Al-Iḥtijāj, vol. 2, p. 136.

64. Sūrat al-Aḥzāb, verse 26.

65. Sūrat al-Ḥashr, verse 2.

66. Sūrat al-Zukhruf, verses 33–35.

67. Sūrat al-Aḥzāb, verse 37.

68. Al-Istīʿāb, vol. 4, p. 184.

69. Sūrat Ṭā Hā, verse 67.

70. Sūrat al-Aʿrāf, verse 116.

71. [Translator: the words quoted after “Pharaoh said to them” are not Pharaoh’s speech; they are the Qurʾān’s narration of what happened when the sorcerers threw, after Moses (a.s.) had said to them, “Throw [yours]” (the opening of Sūrat al-Aʿrāf, verse 116, which the Arabic does not quote). Translated as printed.]

72. Sūrat Ṭā Hā, verse 68.

73. Nahj al-Balāghah, Sermon 4.

74. [Translator: printed al-murād nahu; evidently a misprint for al-murād minhu (“what is meant by it”), which is how it is translated.]

75. Al-Ghadīr, vol. 2, p. 48.

76. Sūrat al-Baqarah, verse 207.

77. Sūrat Āl ʿImrān, verse 128.

78. [Translator: the Arabic reads annahu wa-qāla lahum (“that he… and said to them”); something appears to have dropped out after annahu (“that he”). Translated as printed.]

79. Al-Tibyān, vol. 3, p. 587; Majmaʿ al-Bayān, vols. 3–4, p. 345.

80. Sūrat al-Ḥujurāt, verse 13.

81. Sūrat al-Baqarah, verse 185.

82. Sūrat Yūsuf, verse 21.

83. Sūrat Āl ʿImrān, verse 54.

84. Sūrat Fāṭir, verse 43.

85. Sūrat Ibrāhīm, verse 46.

86. [Translator: Qarai’s rendering takes wa-in kāna makruhum as a negation (“their plots are not such as to dislodge the mountains”), whereas the author explains it in the next sentence as a conditional (“even if they had a plot that would make the mountains pass away”).]

87. [Translator: the Arabic prints qaḍiyyat karn al-amkār; karn is evidently a misprint for kawn (“the proposition that plots … are”), and it has been translated so.]

88. Tafsīr al-Manār, vol. 6, p. 385.

89. Tafsīr ʿAlī ibn Ibrāhīm al-Qummī, vol. 2, p. 181.

90. Sūrat al-Aḥzāb, verse 6.

91. Sūrat al-Tawbah, verse 71.

92. See Tafsīr al-Manār, vol. 6, p. 388.

93. Sūrat al-Shūrā, verse 51.

94. [Translator: the reference is printed as Sūrat al-Shūrā, verse 51, where the words ʿaliyyun ḥakīm describe God (Qarai: “all-exalted, all-wise”). The same words occur in Sūrat al-Zukhruf, verse 4, where they describe the Qurʾān itself (Qarai: ‘and it is sublime and wise with Us in the Mother Book’), which is the sense here; Qarai’s wording of that verse has therefore been used in the text.]

95. Majmaʿ al-Bayān, vols. 3–4, p. 344.

96. [Translator: the Arabic prints taṭʿanū (“that you would revile”), evidently a misprint for yaṭʿanū (“that they would revile”), which the parallel verb yaqūlū (“that they would say”) requires; it has been translated so.]

97. Tafsīr al-ʿAyyāshī, vol. 1, p. 360.

98. Majmaʿ al-Bayān, vols. 3–4, p. 344.

99. [Translator: the chain is printed thus, naming Abū Jaʿfar (a.s.) twice (“from Abū Jaʿfar (a.s.): he said: I heard Abū Jaʿfar (a.s.) say”); it has been translated as printed.]

100. Sūrat al-Māʾidah, verse 3.

101. Al-batl: cutting off (Lisān al-ʿArab, vol. 11, p. 42; Majmaʿ al-Baḥrayn, vol. 5, p. 216, under “b-t-l”).

102. Al-Kāfī, vol. 1, pp. 290–291.

103. See al-Durr al-Manthūr, vol. 3, p. 117.

104. See Jāmiʿ al-Bayān, vol. 6, pp. 395–398; Rūḥ al-Maʿānī, vol. 6, pp. 282–290; Tafsīr al-Manār, vol. 6, pp. 382–390.

105. See Tafsīr al-Mīzān, vol. 6, pp. 44–46 and pp. 56–59.

106. See Tafsīr al-Mīzān, vol. 6, pp. 61–64.

107. Tafsīr ʿAlī ibn Ibrāhīm al-Qummī, vol. 2, p. 181.

108. See al-Ghadīr, vol. 1, pp. 166–184; Tafsīr al-Mīzān, vol. 6, pp. 60–61.

109. Manāqib Āl Abī Ṭālib, Ibn Shahr Āshūb, vol. 3, p. 129; Biḥār al-Anwār, vol. 35, p. 58; al-Burhān fī Tafsīr al-Qurʾān, vol. 2, p. 500.

110. Manāqib Āl Abī Ṭālib, Ibn Shahr Āshūb, vol. 3, pp. 28–29; al-Iḥtijāj, vol. 1, pp. 133–144; Biḥār al-Anwār, vol. 35, p. 58.

111. Manāqib Āl Abī Ṭālib, Ibn Shahr Āshūb, vol. 3, p. 129; Biḥār al-Anwār, vol. 35, p. 58.

112. Sūrat al-Nisāʾ, verse 59.

113. Al-Kāfī, vol. 1, pp. 286–287.

114. Sūrat al-Māʾidah, verse 55.

115. Al-Kāfī, vol. 1, p. 289.

116. Sūrat al-Māʾidah, verse 55.

117. Al-Iḥtijāj, vol. 1, p. 142.

118. Sūrat al-Naṣr, verse 1.

119. Sūrat al-Zukhruf, verses 79–80.

120. Tafsīr ʿAlī ibn Ibrāhīm al-Qummī, vol. 1, pp. 180–181.

121. Sūrat Yūnus, verse 58.

122. Sūrat Ṭā Hā, verse 82.

123. Al-Amālī, al-Ṣadūq, p. 400.

124. [Translator: so printed (al-Zuhrī). Where the author quotes the same story earlier, in a footnote to the discussion of Sūrat al-Maʿārij (Arabic p. 482), from al-Kashf wa-l-Bayān, the man is named al-Ḥārith ibn al-Nuʿmān al-Fihrī (printed “al-Qahrī”, corrected in brackets to “al-Fihrī”), and the next footnote there adds that he is also said to be al-Nuʿmān ibn al-Ḥārith.]

125. Sūrat al-Anfāl, verse 32.

126. Sūrat al-Maʿārij, verse 1.

127. Majmaʿ al-Bayān, vols. 9–10, p. 530; Shawāhid al-Tanzīl, vol. 2, pp. 286–287.

128. Sūrat al-Anfāl, verse 33.

129. Sūrat al-Māʾidah, verse 3.

130. [Translator: the clause is printed kayfa wa-huwa min sirrin wa-lā ʿalāniyah (“how, when He is of secret and not of open”), with the negative lā before the second term only; this is hard to construe, and it has been translated as printed.]

131. [Translator: printed alladhī ablā al-dahra qudsuhu wa-lladhī yufnī al-abada nūruhu, literally “whose holiness has worn out time, and whose light makes eternity pass away”. Since eternity (al-abad) by definition does not pass away, the wording reads oddly and may be misprinted; it has been rendered as closely as the sense allows.]

132. Sūrat al-Māʾidah, verse 55.

133. Sūrat Āl ʿImrān, verse 167. [Translator: Sūrat Āl ʿImrān, verse 167 reads yaqūlūna bi-afwāhihim (“they say with their mouths”); the wording quoted, yaqūlūna bi-alsinatihim (“they say with their tongues”), is that of Sūrat al-Fatḥ, verse 11.]

134. Sūrat al-Tawbah, verse 61.

135. Sūrat al-Tawbah, verse 61.

136. Sūrat al-Tawbah, verse 61.

137. [Translator: printed wa-l-shakku fī dhālika fa-huwa fī al-nār (“and doubt concerning that — it is in the Fire”); the construction calls for al-shākk, “the one who doubts”, but it has been translated as printed.]

138. Sūrat al-Zumar, verse 56.

139. [Translator: the sentence is printed thus, with “the Commander of the Faithful” as its subject and “had lifted ʿAlī” as its predicate; since the Commander of the Faithful is ʿAlī himself, the sentence does not read straightforwardly, and words appear to have dropped out. It has been translated as printed.]

140. Sūrat Āl ʿImrān, verse 85.

141. Sūrat al-Tawbah, verse 17.

142. Sūrat Āl ʿImrān, verse 88.

143. Sūrat al-Insān, verse 1.

144. Sūrat al-ʿAṣr.

145. Sūrat al-Nūr, verse 54.

146. Sūrat Āl ʿImrān, verse 102.

147. Sūrat al-Nisāʾ, verse 47.

148. Sūrat al-Raḥmān, verse 31.

149. Sūrat al-Raḥmān, verse 35.

150. Sūrat Āl ʿImrān, verse 179.

151. Sūrat al-Mursalāt, verses 16–19.

152. Sūrat al-Fātiḥah, verse 2.

153. Sūrat al-Anʿām, verse 112.

154. Al-Iḥtijāj, vol. 1, pp. 133–144.

155. Sūrat al-Aḥzāb, verse 6.

156. [Translator: the text of the sermon as given above does not quote Sūrat al-Aḥzāb, verse 6; the author’s remark has been translated as printed.]

157. Sūrat al-Māʾidah, verse 55.