Ahsan Hanif – Quran Tafseer – Page 104 – Divine Guidance And Consequences
AI: Summary ©
AI: Transcript ©
The tafseer page by page and InshaAllah Ta'ala.
Today, we are on page 104 which is
in the 6th chapter of Quran Surat Nisa.
In the previous episode, we mentioned those verses
in which Allah aesawajal describes the people of
the scripture and in particular those who by
way of their sin, some of those sins
being their rejection of Allah signs, some of
those sins being unjustly killing some of their
prophets, some of those those sins
being some of the statements that they made
concerning
some of those people that Allah
had chosen and elevated such as 'Isa
and his mother Maryam 'alayhi salam. For example,
that they accused
her with slander or they slander her and
accused her of being unchaste and immodest. Allah
subhanahu wa ta'ala after ministering all of this,
Allah speaks about the major sins that they
were engaged in such as zina and devouring
the wealth of people unjustly.
Allah
makes a distinction between those people and what
they did and between those people from amongst
them who were fully grounded upon knowledge and
because of that they believed in all of
the scriptures and they believed in all of
the prophets and the messengers of Allah. They
established the salah and they gave the zakah.
We begin today with verse 163
and there is an extension of the same
topic in which Allah now will expand
upon those people who believe in all of
the prophets of Allah
and how those prophets came with one central
message and that is the central message of
the tawheed of Allah that you should worship
Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala alone and obey him
Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala submitting to his will.
Allah says in verse 163
We have sent revelation to you, meaning the
Prophet
as we did to Nuh and the Prophets
after him
To Ibrahim, to Ismail, to Ishaq, to Yaqub
and the tribes.
Theresa,
to Ayub, to Yunus, Harun and Soleiman.
And indeed to thy word we gave the
book of the Psalms.
Allah azza wa Jal in this verse speaks
about the
favour that Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala has upon
mankind and the blessing that he bestowed upon
them that he sent to all of them
prophets and messengers
to whom he inspired with revelation from himself
Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala. Allah says that indeed we
gave to you revelation meaning the Prophet sallallahu
alaihi wasallam and we know that the prophet
salallahu alaihi wasallam was the last and the
seal in a long line of prophets and
messengers that began all the way from the
time of Adam alaihi salallahu alaihi wasallam as
the first prophet of Allah azza wa Jal
and from the time of Nuharihi salam as
the first messenger of Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala
sent to the people of the earth. Allah
says that we sent this revelation to you
as we sent it to those who came
before you from the time of Nuh and
the prophets that followed after him.
Allah mentions the Prophet Nuh here
specifically
because Nuh as we said was the first
Messenger of Allah
before the time of Nuh
from the time of Adam until the time
of Nuh, everyone was upon Tawhid as is
mentioned in the narration of Ibn Abbas radiAllahu
anhu. That after Allah Azzawaj sent our father
Adam
down upon the earth,
for 10 generations people stayed upon Tawhid. They
were upon the worship of Allah
until a time came
when there were 5 righteous
people and those 5 righteous people passed away
and Allah azza wa jal will mention them
by name in Surat al Noor in the
29th Juz.
When those 5 righteous people died, Shaitan came
to those people in the form of a
man and he said to them, these people
amongst you were righteous, known for their works
of piety and goodness.
Surely you should build some type of reminder
to them so that when you see those
reminders they remind you of Allah Subhanahu WA
Ta'ala and to worship and be like them
in terms of their righteousness and goodness.
So he made it appealing to them that
they should make statues in the forms of
those 5 men.
And look at how at the beginning
the reasoning for that is one which is
very innocent as a reminder, as something which
will inspire you and motivate you, encourage you
to worship as these men worshiped, and then
he leaves them. That generation passes away and
another comes and passes away until a time
comes when those people that are living now
can no longer remember the origin of those
statues and where they came from and what
the reason was behind them. So then shaitan
came to them again in the form of
a human and he said to them, 'Shall
I not tell you what these statues are
for that you don't know what they're for.
They're just there. You know that your parents,
your grandparents, your forefathers used to honor them,
but you don't know how they used to
honor them and then he said to them
that they used to worship them. These are
gods. These are the people that you or
these are the gods that you should worship
and that is when they began
to or that is the first time that
Sheikh became manifest upon the earth. And it
is after that time that Allah sent the
Prophet Nuh alaihi sallam.
Allah says that we have sent revelation to
you O Muhammad salallahu alaihi wasalam as we
did to Nuh and the prophets who came
after him. And then Allah mentions them Ibrahim
and his 2 sons Ishmael and Ishaq
and the son of Ishaq Yaqub and
the tribes that came from Yaqub alayhi sallam
that are his tribes that essentially became Bani
Israel and then the different prophets and messengers
that were sent to Bani Israel from among
them Ariese
and Ayoub and Yunus and Harun and Sulaiman.
And Allah says that we gave to Dawud
'alayhi salam the zabur.' Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala
mentions and names a number of prophets here.
Each one of them their stories is mentioned
elsewhere in the Qur'an in more detail, and
Allah honors them here in the sense that
he specifies them by name and mentions them
but also to show to us that their
message was 1 and the same. There is
no difference between Nuh and Ibrahim,
no difference between Ibrahim and
Risa and Ayyub or Ayyub and Harun and
Suleiman and Dawud. And that is because all
of these prophets, despite the different times that
they came in, the different nations that perhaps
they were sent to, the different lands that
they lived in, all of them came with
one central message and that is the message
of the Tawhid of Allah Azzawajal, the worship
of Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala alone.
Allah Azzawajal then says in verse 164,
Allah says that there were many prophets and
messengers
that
Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala spoke directly.
Allah says that there were many prophets and
messengers that Allah
sent to the people of the earth over
the generations and over time.
From amongst them are those that are mentioned
in the Quran
in addition and above to what Allah Azzawajal
just mentioned in the previous verse. So some
of the prophets salallahu alayhi wa sallam mentioned
by naming that verse such as for example
the prophet Yusuf alayhi salatu wa sallam or
the prophet Zakariyah and Yahya alayhi wasallam. These
are prophets salallahu alayhi wa jal mentioned their
story in the Quran, they are not necessarily
mentioned here in that verse. But Allah says
that there are other prophets as you know
that we have mentioned their stories to in
the Quran.
And then there are prophets and messengers
that you know nothing of. That there are
stories we have not mentioned to you. And
that is why as we have said previously
from the iman of the Muslim when it
comes to this pillar of faith which is
belief in the messengers,
we believe in all of the prophets and
messengers of Allah. Even if we don't know
their names and their stories or when they
came or who they came to, we believe
in them. Because Allah tells us that there
are prophets and messengers
that we don't know of. And in the
notion of
over which the scholars
mention
some some some statements concerning its authenticity and
so on. But in that narration it is
mentioned that Allah when he was asked by
radiAllahu and the Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam said
that Allah
sent prophets over a 120,000.
Abu Dard then said, O Messenger of Allah,
how many were messengers from those prophets? He
said some 300 odd.
And so therefore that shows you, either way,
whether that statement is exact in terms of
its number or not that narration, it shows
you that Allah has just sent many prophets
and messengers in the thousands they came and
we know also that there were prophets and
messengers that we were not familiar with because
in the authentic narrations the Prophet told us
that
a Prophet will come on Yawmul Qiyam and
he will only have 3 followers and a
Prophet with 2 followers and a Prophet with
a single follower and a Prophet of Allah
will come on Yomul Qiyamah on the Day
of Judgement and you won't have a single
person following him. No one believed in him.
No one accepted him. No one listened to
him. But still he is a Prophet of
Allah and still he has the honour of
the Prophets of Allah
And so Allah
sent many Prophets to the people.
Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala sent prophets to the
people so that they would know the way
back to their Lord. They would know what
Allah
created them for and their purpose of existence
upon this earth.
That is the worship of Allah alone. Allah
sent those prophets so that they would be
examples and guides to those people, that they
would show them the halal from the Haram
and that they would make clear to them
that which is pleasing to Allah from that
which will incur his wrath and his anger.
And so Allah says here that we sent
to you many prophets, prophets whom you know
in terms of their stories because they are
mentioned in the Quran, Allah has given
to us their stories, the likes of Hud,
Salih, Sharayb, Alut and others and then the
Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi wa Jal didn't tell you
off, didn't mention their stories too.
Waqallamullah
Musa Taklima
and from the famous of Allah is
that he spoke to Musa alayhi wa sallam
directly and that is when Musa Alaihi Salam
was on the mountain and Allah Subhanahu Wa
Ta'ala spoke to him directly and Allah does
as he pleases Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala for whomsoever
he wishes of his creation.
In verse 165 Allah azza wa Jal then
says speaking about these prophets and messengers
They were messengers bearing good news and warning.
So that mankind would have no excuse before
Allah
once the messengers had been sent. Indeed Allah
is Almighty and All Wise.
Allah
in this verse says that Allah sent the
prophets and messengers, all of these messengers, whether
we know their stories or we don't know
them, whether they we know them by name
or we don't know their names. Allah said
all of these prophets and messengers
with 2 main
responsibilities,
2 main tasks,
and that is to give glad tidings and
to give warnings.
They would give good news, glad tidings and
they would also bring warning. The glad tiding
is the tiding of those people who follow
the path of Tawhid. If you worship Allah
alone and you obey the commandments of Allah
Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala and you live your life
in accordance with that which Allah has legislated,
then you have glad tidings. Your glad tidings
are that Allah will not punish you, that
you will have Jannah, his reward,
his mercy and his forgiveness. Subhanahu wa ta'ala.
As the Prophet told us
in the hadith of Mu'adh Abu Jabbal. When
he
called out to Mu'adh and he said, 'O
Mu'adh, do you know what is the right
of Allah upon his creation?'
And Wa'adh said, 'Allah and his Messenger know
best. He said, the right of Allah upon
his creation is that they should worship him
alone
without any partner.'
And then he said, 'Omu'ad,
do you know what is
the right of the creation upon their Lord
upon Allah azza wa Jal?' And he said,
'Allan is Messenger no best' meaning that Allah
has made this a right upon himself because
we have no rights upon Allah but Allah
can make something incumbent and obligatory upon himself
subhanahu wa'ala if he chooses to do so.
What is the right of the creation upon
Allah? He said Mu'adh said, Allah and his
messenger know best. The Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam
replied,
he said that if they do that meaning
they fulfill the first part which is the
tawhid of Allah
then he won't punish them. That he won't
punish them. That he will give to them
their reward, that they will have Jannah as
Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala promises in the Quran.
And therefore
Allah is saying that this was one of
the main tasks of the prophets and messengers
of Allah. They came to give people this
good news. All you have to do in
this life
is live your life according to the rules
that Allah has set for you. There are
certain things that you stay away from and
those things in and of themselves are detrimental
and harmful to you in ways. Maybe you
don't appreciate them, maybe you don't understand them,
maybe you're short sighted so you don't realize
but they are detrimental to you. All of
the things that Allah
has made haram, either because they harm you
or they harm others around you. And either
way that is something which is detrimental
to the whole community and the whole society.
And Allah
has said to you, do certain things that
are obligatory upon you, fulfill certain obligations
because they are the rights of Allah or
they are the rights of the people around
you from your parents, from your relatives, from
your children and likewise from those people that
have need of you like the poor and
the needy and the orphans and so on
and so forth. Fulfill these obligations,
stay away from these prohibitions
and you will have the reward of Allah
That is the first task of the Prophets,
to make that clear and the second task,
the second responsibility,
and there are warners.
Warners to those people that if you don't
fulfil this part, which is the Tawhid of
Allah, his obligations, staying away from his Haram,
then you are under the threat of his
punishment. Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala. You are under the
threat of the punishment of Allah and
we are warning you of that destruction. And
those Prophets came with different types of warnings
from amongst those prophets were those who came
with the warning that Allah will destroy you
upon this earth. You will be destroyed here
and now as happened with many of the
prophets of Allah as we know in the
stories of the people of Nooh and A'at
and Thamud and Lot and Shaib and so
on and so forth.
Or
that Allah if he doesn't punish you in
this life, he may punish you on your
Multiyama.
And that may also depend on 2 things.
Number 1, if you don't fulfil the central
aspect of this religion which is tawhid, then
you will be punished because that is the
promise that Allah has given in the Quran
that Allah does not forgive shirk. And if
you fulfil Tawhid
but you don't perform those obligations, you don't
stay away from the Haram
then Allah may choose to punish you if
you so wishes Subhanu wa Ta'ala because of
the sins that you have incurred
or because of the obligations that you have
fallen short of.
That is what Allah
sent these prophets and messengers for. Why? Why
did he send them with these warnings, these
light tidings?
So that the people would have no excuse
before Allah once the messengers had been sent.
No one can come on Yomul Qiyama and
say, oh Allah, I did not know. Oh
Allah, I was unaware.
Oh Allah, no one told me. Oh Allah,
there was no message that came to me.
I didn't receive any of your revelation or
none of that revelation was recited to me.
Allah Azzawajal sent these prophets and messengers
with the clear
message from Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala so that
no one would have an excuse and that
is because from Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala's justice
and his fairness is that Allah did not
just leave us by ourselves
without any revelation, any guides, any examples
just to figure out for ourselves what to
do and what not to do because that
way we would like confusion,
that way we would like chaos, that way
we would like the different people having different
ideas. So Allah made clear to them the
way and the path that is pleasing to
him. This is the Siratal Mustaqeem.
This is the straight path. You follow it,
you reach your destination which is Jannah. You
stray from it, then you may be punished
by Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala in this life
or in the next or possibly in both.
So that the people when they come
will have no excuse.
The messengers,
the prophets of Allah, they are witnesses amongst
their people. As we mentioned in that verse
at the beginning of the of the of
the second Jews of the Quran in Surat
Al Baqarah. Allah says that the messengers of
Allah, his prophets
are witnesses
over the people. They will come and they
will say we conveyed the message of Allah
and if those people dispute the conveying of
the message then Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala will
call this Ummah to testify
based upon the truth that we have in
the book of Allah in the Quran. So
no one has an excuse.
No one can come before Allah and
say I didn't know,
I was unaware,
I was ignorant, no one told me. Mother
Allah has established evidence and that is from
the fairness and justice of Allah subhanahu wa
ta'ala because once people know they have no
excuse of ignorance.
Waqana Allahu Aziz and Hakima
and Allah
is almighty all wise.
In verse 166, Allah subhanahu ta'ala then says,
but Allah himself bears witness to what he
has sent down to you. He has sent
it down with his full knowledge. The angels
too bear witness
though Allah is sufficient as a witness.
Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala says that if these
people come and they dispute this revelation
that it wasn't sent, that they didn't understand,
that it didn't come to them, Allah Azzawajal
is a witness that Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala
sent down the revelation to you meaning the
Messenger of Allah Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam.
Allah sent down this revelation to Muhammad Sallallahu
Alaihi Wasallam. So if the Quraysh dispute it,
the Arabs dispute it, people who come afterwards
dispute it, Allah knows
what he sent down and Allah knows what
he gave us revelation
and that is why not only for this
Ummah but the Ummahs that came before the
nations that preceded us, Allah knows that he
gave them prophets, sent to them messengers, sent
to them revelation,
the words of Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala
and so those prophets and messengers of Allah
are establishing the proof upon those particular nations.
And Allah says that he sent it down
with his full knowledge. Allah knows what he
sent down Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala and Allah knows
to whom it was sent down and who
received that message.
And likewise
all of the angels bear witness. The angels
that heard the revelation of Allah Azza wa
Jal that bore witness to the revelation descending
that brought it down from amongst them Jibreel
alayhi salaam that brought it down to those
prophets and messengers of Allah. They are also
witnesses.
But Allah alone is sufficient as a witness.
Allah doesn't need anyone else to bear witness
alongside him but again from the total justice
and fairness of Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala
is that Allah has other witnesses as well
And that is why
as we know when a person will come
and they will have led a life of
kufr and disbelief and sin, Allah
will make their own bodies testify against them.
Allah knows he's all hearing, all seeing, everything
is recorded and Allah is sufficient as a
witness. But those people will not accept that
testimony
so Allah will make their own selves
testify against them. Their own hands, their own
feet, their own limbs will testify against them.
And so Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala
says that this is how Allah has his
perfect justice
Allah
says in verse 167
that the reality of those people who disbelieve
is that they won't accept this, that they
won't accept the revelation or the prophets or
the messengers.
Those who have disbelieved
and barred others from Allah's path have gone
far astray.
Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala speaks about these groups
of people now
who we know that when the Messenger of
Allah would come throughout the generations, every single
nation had these people. When the prophets would
come, they would find amongst them people
who were barring others from the path of
Allah ajduja.
They disbelieve themselves
but worse they are stopping others from receiving
that revelation and
guidance. They are the ones who will follow
the Prophets around and mock them openly,
ridicule them openly,
punish them openly,
oppress them openly,
harm them openly. They were the ones who
when people would come to try to listen,
they would ward them off and push them
away, threaten them, intimidate them, whatever way that
they could use and means that they could
use in order to stop those people coming
closer to that revelation, they would do so.
And like in the time of the Prophet
Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam, when sometimes people would come
and they would want to just out of
curiosity listen to the prophet sallallahu alaihi wa
sallam. This man who's come and has changed
the whole system in Arabia is upended.
The whole system has become upside down because
of what he's saying. People are now leaving
the religion of their forefathers, families are being
split, the slaves that used to be weak
are being honored, all sorts are happening. People
were curious,
what is he saying, what's his message, what
are the words that he is reciting
and the Quraysh would say to them, this
man is crazy
he is a magician if you listen to
his words, he will bewitch you. And no
one wants to be bewitched, no one wants
to go crazy, no one wants to go
back to their family insane, so they would
say to them, what should you do in
the city of Mecca, just in case he
comes and reads words and they enter into
your heart or you hear them and they
enter into you and then you become crazy
or bewitched?
Take cotton
or take something that you can place in
your ears so that even if he comes
across you or you come across him and
he's reading and reciting, you won't listen to
what he's saying. You won't hear any of
his words. And that's what they would do.
And they would bar people from Mecca when
they would come in and they would say,
beware. There's a crazy man in Mecca these
days. His name is Muhammad salallahu alaihi wa
sallam. He's a crazy man. Beware of him.
And as as I mentioned in some of
the narrations that some of the people who
later accepted Islam said that we came to
Mecca
and we would see the Prophet sallallahu alaihi
wa sallam going around calling people to Allah,
telling them to believe in Islam, and we
would see a man following him behind him
saying to those same people, don't listen to
him, he's crazy. Don't listen to him, he's
not woe. Don't listen to him, he's a
poet or a madman.
And so
these people who are strangers
to this land of Mecca, they would ask
people who are these people? Who are these
2 men? They would say the first one
is Muhammad Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam. He claims to
be a prophet of Allah and he's calling
people to his new religion. And the man
who's behind him is his own uncle Abu
Lahab. He's going around saying this is my
nephew, I know him, don't listen to him,
he's crazy.
And most people when they hear that, especially
if it's from someone who's a close family
member, the father, the mother, the the grandparents,
the uncles, the aunts, don't mind him. It's
something not right with him. Don't mind him.
It's not a while. People tend to believe
them. They tend to believe and take that
word for them. These are different ways and
paths as we see that people were
barred from the path of Allah azza wa
Jal. Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala is saying in
this verse 1 67
that those who disbelieve
and bar others from the path of Allah
azza wa Jal, they have indeed strayed very
far.
Allah will not forgive those who have disbelieved
and do evil. No will He guide them
to any path. These people have disbelieved and
because of the oppression and the harm that
they have done over and above, they will
never find the straight path. They will never
believe. Their hearts have become sealed
because Allah knows that there is no good
in them, that they will never accept guidance,
that they will never accept Islam.
So they will only go and become harmful
enemies to the message of Islam, they will
only bow others away, bow others from the
path of Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala. They will
only harm and do oppression to the believers.
Allah
says they will never find the path. And
that is what you see in the time
of the Prophet
those leaders of Quraish, the likes of Abu
Lahab and Abu Jahl and Hudba and Shaiba
and all of those other leaders of Quraish.
This is what happened to them despite them
being
by the Kaaba in Makka drinking from Zamzam
from the lineage of the prophet Ibrahim al
Ismail alaihi wasalam
they didn't accept the message of the Prophet
because the message of Islam is not based
upon your lineage
or your location or what you eat or
drink necessarily,
thought is based upon the purity of a
person's heart and their willingness to find and
accept revelation.
And that is why Allah says concerning them
in verse 169 that they will not find
a path or be guided to it except
waliqaajahhanamaqaridinafihaabada wakanada rika'alaalahi
aseera
except that of * meaning they will not
be guided to a path except the path
to hal, where they will remain forever. This
is easy for Allah azza wa Jal. They
will never find guidance in this life, they
will never find a path that will lead
them to paradise,
the path that they will find will lead
them to the fire and that is what
happened to them they found that path to
the fire and they followed it until their
end until their demise and their death and
that is something which Allah Azza wa Jalal,
it is easy for him Allah Subhanahu Wa
Ta'ala,
it is not difficult upon him to do
away with those people who are the enemies
of his religion and his prophets and messengers.
In the final verse that we will take
today, verse 1 70 Allah Azzawajal then
says, giving this
Quran.
O mankind, the messenger has come to you
with the truth from your lord. So believe
what is best for you. For even if
you disbelieve,
all that is in the heavens and the
earth still belongs to Allah and He is
all knowing all wise. So after mentioning the
names of all of these prophets, after mentioning
why they were sent and the message that
they were sent with and then after mentioning
those people who disbelieve in them, turn away
from them, bar others from the path that
leads to them and do all of that
harm and oppression towards them that eventually leads
them to the path of the fire, Allah
gives this command.
O people,
the messenger has come to you, so follow
him. He's come with the truth from your
Lord, follow him, believe in him. Because if
you don't, Allah has no need for you.
If you don't, Allah owns everything in the
heavens and the earth. Allah has no need
for you and you harm no one but
yourself and Allah
is all knowing
and all wise. And with that, InshaAllah Ta'ala,
we come to the end of today's episode.