O Muslims - 17

In the Name of Allah, the Gracious, the Merciful

Extracts from QUR’AANIC STUDIES – A Modern Tafsir PART I:

156. Ya ayyuha allatheena amanoo la takoonoo kaallatheena kafaroo waqaloo li-ikhwanihim itha daraboo fee al-ardi aw kanoo ghuzzan law kanoo AAindana ma matoo wama qutiloo liyajAAala Allahu thalika hasratan fee quloobihim waAllahu yuhyee wayumeetu waAllahu bima taAAmaloona baseerun

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3:156. O you who believe! Be not like those who suppress the Truth and say of their brothers, travelling through the earth or fighting, "If they had stayed back with us, they would not have died or been slain", so that Allah makes it anguish in their subconscious.¹⁶⁴ And Allah it is that gives life and causes death. And Allah sees all that you do.

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164. While the believers had come out to fight the battle, with reference to which these Verses were revealed, there were those suppressors of Truth who had preferred to remain back at Madina. It is the utterance of these latter people that is quoted here in this Verse. Allah says that the 3rd purpose for His inflicting sorrow upon sorrow on the believers in the battlefield was to make it anguish for those incorrigible people back at Madina, the casualties being those of their own ethnic brothers. About the 1st and the 2nd purposes, please see Note 161 on Verse 154 hereinabove. Allah's purpose in inflicting sorrow after sorrow in the battlefield was thus three-fold, for three different categories of people:

1.   the believers whose Faith had entered their subconscious,

2.   the believers whose Faith had not yet entered their subconscious,

3.       the suppressors of Truth among the ethnic brothers of the believers.

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Mohammad Shafi

Friday, the 5^th of June 2020.

O Muslims - 7

In the Name of Allah, the Gracious, the Merciful

Excerpts from QUR’AANIC STUDIES – A Modern Tafsir PART I:

254. Ya ayyuha allatheena amanoo anfiqoo mimma razaqnakum min qabli an ya/tiya yawmun la bayAAun feehi wala khullatun wala shafaAAatun waalkafiroona humu alththalimoona

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2:254. O you believers! Spend of what We have given you before the advent of the Day during which shall there be no trade, no friendship and no intercession. And suppressors of the Truth – those are the wrong-doers.⁴⁸¹

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481. This Verse reveals to us several things:

·         Allah given things – like wealth, wisdom, time – are to be made use of and not just hoarded or wasted away.

·         Every individual's position in the Hereafter inter alia depends on the way he uses those Allah-given things here.

·         The proper use of those things may make him/her eligible for entry into Paradise, and their misuse may land him/her in Hell.

·         Evaluation of every individual on Judgment Day shall be strictly impartial. No good man would be able to buy a better place in the Hereafter for his friend/relative.

·         In the Hereafter, there is no scope for any intercession – from a friend, a relative, or even a Prophet. Beware, Muslims and Christians!

·         Those who do not believe in all that the Verse implies are only deluding themselves and others. And, consequentially, they are oppressing themselves and others.

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Mohammad Shafi

Friday, the 27^th of March 2020.

O Muslims

In the Name of Allah, the Gracious, the Merciful

Extract from QUR’AANIC STUDIES – A Modern Tafsir PART I:

29. Ya ayyuha allatheena amanoo la ta/kuloo amwalakum baynakum bialbatili illa an takoona tijaratan AAan taradin minkum wala taqtuloo anfusakum inna Allaha kana bikum raheeman

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4:29. O you who believe! Do not consume your property among yourselves wrongfully; except that you do it by way of trading with mutual consent. And commit no suicides, nor kill one another amongst you! Indeed, Allah is Merciful to you.

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Mohammad Shafi

Friday, the 7^th of February 2020.