In the name of God, the Most Gracious, the Most Merciful

31- [Abraham] said: “And [afterwards] what is your errand (khatb), O messengers?”

32- They replied, “We have been sent to a people lost in sin (mujrim)

33- to bring down upon them baked clay,

34- marked by your Lord for the transgressors (musrif).”

35- Then we evacuated the believers (mu’minin) from there.

36- But we found not within them other than a [single] household of muslims,

37- and left the town to be a sign for those who fear the painful punishment.

38- There is also a sign for you in the story of Moses when We sent him to Pharaoh with clear proof (sultan).

39- Pharaoh turned away (tawalla), relying upon his supporters (rukn), saying, “This is a sorcerer or a crazy man.”

40- So we seized him and his forces and threw them into the sea. He was to blame.

41- There is another sign in the ‘Ad, against whom We sent the life-destroying wind.

42- It spared nothing that it reached, but made it [all] as dust. After eight days no trace of life remained, for even the plants and trees had been annihilated.

43- And also to the Thamud, who were told, “Enjoy yourselves for a while.”

44- They rebelled against the command of your Lord, so the thunderbolt seized them while they were looking on.

45- They could not even remain standing, let alone defend themselves.

46- Before that We destroyed the people of Noah: they were a wicked people (fasiq).

47- We built (banayna-ha) the heavens with Our power and indeed extended them (musioun).

48- And Earth we spread out (farsh). And how well We smoothed it out (mahid).

49- and We created pairs of all things so that you [people] might take note.

50- [So say to them, O Prophet], “Therefore, flee unto God. I am sent by Him to give you clear warning (indhar).

51- And do not set up any other god alongside Him (ma? Allah). I am sent by Him to give you clear warning.”

52- Similarly, no messenger came to those before them but they said [of him] in like manner, “A sorcerer or a crazy man.”

53- Did they tell one another to do this? No! They are a people who exceed all bounds (taghun),

54- So turn away from them, [for] you are not to blame.

55- Continue to remind them, for reminding profits the believers.

56- I created the jinn and humans (ins) only that they may do ‘ibadah of Me.

57- I seek no sustenance (rizq) from them, nor do I ask that they feed Me.

58- God is the All-Sustainer, the Lord of Power, the Ever Strong (matin).

59- Those who do wrong (dhunub), like their predecessors, will have a share of punishment – they need not ask Me to hasten it.

60- Woe then to those who deny the truth on the Day they have been promised.

[51:31] [Abraham] said: “And [afterwards] what is your errand (khatb), O messengers?”
Abraham was so humble and pure-hearted that he could not believe that these angels had been sent only to bring him this bit of personal news.They must have been sent for a khatb, which refers to an important duty or something momentous.

[51:32] They replied, “We have been sent to a people lost in sin (mujrim)

[51:33] to bring down upon them baked clay,
Jurm means to cut off or to sever, and so a mujrim is someone who cuts himself or herself off from God. A similitude for this is a tree that grows well when it is connected to the sun and able to absorb carbon dioxide from the air as well as minerals and water from the ground. Cutting it off from any one ofthese things, all of which are necessary for its life, is thus a jurm (a crime, if you will) and an act of cruelty, for doing so will cause the tree to begin to shrivel and eventually die. Therefore, cutting one’s relations with God, people, history, time, or the afterlife can be called a jurm. This is why these angels said that they have been sent to punish the mujrimīn.

[51:34] marked by your Lord for the transgressors (musrif).”
A musrif is defined as an immoderate person The verbal nounisrāf,of which musrif is the active participle, means to be excessive or extravagant in spending one’s wealth. However, the Qur’an uses it for someone whose behavior has transgressed the bounds of human decency and reason. This could apply to just about any area of life, whether seeking power and authority over others, social status, or wealth.
The verse does not detail how these clay stones will rain down, but merely alludes to them. However, we saw that Lot’s people were destroyed by a volcaniceruption, an event that passes through different phases of intensity.The worst case scenario is when gases released from the sub-surface magma become trapped andcause a massive build-up of pressure that eventually explodes like a gigantic bomb. This incredibly destructive event, which is usually accompanied by an earthquake, creates a wide radius of devastation. Vast quantities of molten lava and ash are thrown into the atmosphere and rain down on the surrounding area, burying everything beneath them. Numerous Qur’anic verses refer to these terrifying events. In any case, it appears that precisely such an event took place close to where Lot’s people were living, for: “…that We may rain upon them stones of clay.” The Qur’an also calls these stones sijjīl, which appears to be derived from the Persian expression sang gil (lit. stone of clay), in which the Persian letter g becomes an Arabic j. This story isrelated in various forms across six of the Qur’an’s chapters.

[51:35] Then we evacuated the believers(mu’minīn) from there.
Other chapters indicate that this is Lot’s household, all of whom were saved but his wife. However, this and other verses appear to suggest that as no one else from the city had responded to his preaching, only his household and maybe a few hangers-on and followerswere exempted from this divine punishment.

[51:36] But we found not within them other than a [single] household of muslims,
In this verse, the angels say they took outeveryone who was a believer (mu’min) but found only one household of muslims. This is a very significant point, for thesemuslimswere not the followers of Islam as we know it today, becauseit did not exist at that time. However, when “belief” (īmān) reaches its apex, it becomes islām in the literal sense of true submission to God. We all know that reciting “There is no god but God and Muhammad is His Messenger” is enough to enter Islam. However, people do not attain the highest level of faith and submission to God merely by uttering these words, but only become “real”muslims when they submit their entire being to the Truth. On several occasions, the Qur’an says that Abraham “was asubmitting monotheist” (kāna hanīfan musliman) (3:67). In fact, the Qur’an describes each of God’s prophets as muslim as well as Jesus’ apostles (hawāriyūn): They say to Jesus: “We have faith in God, and bear witness that we are muslims” (5:111). Some who read these verses erroneously suppose that these individuals’ religion was the same as the Islam Muslims practice today. However, the Qur’anic termislāmdoes not refer to the name of a religious identity that people might inherit from their family, but to the act of submitting to God’s commands. Read the Qur’an’s account of Solomon and the Queen of Sheba, who self-identifies asmuslim, even though there was no religion called Islam at that time. The Qur’an says: “the creed of your father, Abraham. He named you muslims before” (22:78). Therefore, it was Abraham who blazed the path of submission and surrender to God and who was the founder of monotheism.
Given the Qur’an’s assertion that there is only one religion, saying “divine religions” is incorrect because the only truly divine religion is submission to God. However, this religion contains different codes (sharīʻah), each of which has a different prescription for implementing and manifesting this submission. For example, Noah’s form of this religion was appropriate to his cultural milieu. Abraham,Moses, Jesus, and Muhammad all brought different forms of submission to their peoples. This is why, when we look back at history, people’s practices have never been uniform.As the Qur’an says: “He has prescribed for you the religion which He had enjoined upon Noah and which We have [also] revealed to you, and which We had enjoined upon Abraham, Moses, and Jesus” (42:13).
The Qur’anic understanding of “submission” is not that of a soldier compelled to submit to his enemy for whatever reason, but to surrender one’s heart to God as opposed tothe idols and tyrants of one’s own time. Someone who loves God will submit to Him, for doing so enables one to follow the right path,the one that ends with the True One.

[51:37] and left the town to be a sign for those who fear the painful punishment.
This is an example for those who fear relapsing into sin and error and know that every action produces its own consequence(s). As the poet says:“Do wrong and you are not safe from harm / nature means that actions have consequences.”

[51:38] There is also a sign for you in the story of Moses when We sent him to Pharaoh with clear proof(sultān).
Sultān means a forceful argument. In Moses’ case, this “argument” consisted of manifest proofs and clear miracles.

[51:39] Pharaoh turned away(tawallā), relying upon his supporters(rukn), saying, “This is a sorcerer or a crazy man.”
Pharaoh’s behavior indicates his lack of concernwith what Moses had to say as well as his decision to rely upon his rukn, namely, the army upon which his power and authority rested.Such a reaction is common among those who reject something with contempt. Pharaoh turned away from Moses and the clear logic he presented because he was secure in his belief that his military, political, and economic might would protect him.
At this time, magicians were highly educated people who knew things that others did not and thuscould do things that seemed miraculous.A crazy person is one who lacks reason and comprehension.So how could such a person possibly be mistaken for a crazy man? This is why Pharaoh says that Moses is either a magician or a crazy man.

[51:40] So we seized him and his forces and threw them into the sea.He was to blame.
Those who turn their back on the truth and arearrogant naturally deserve blame and reproach, and those who have no interest in changing their ways or improving themselves should be criticized.

[51:41] There is another sign in the ‘Ād, against whom We sent the life-destroying wind.
The ‘Ādalso denied God’s messengers. Although winds usually play an important role in creating clouds and pollinating plants, there are also chaotic winds – known as “barren winds” – that benefit noliving thing. The Qur’ansays that the ‘Ād were subjected to a barren, icy wind for seven nights and eight days until they had all perished. In our own time, we have witnessed tsunamis and many other devastating natural events (e.g., Hurricane Katrina). Whenever the natural order is unbalanced, we see more large-scale destruction and devastation. Such an intense hurricane befellthe ‘Ād that everything exposed to it became like a decayed bone.

[51:42] It spared nothing that it reached, but made it [all] as dust.
After eight days no trace of life remained, for even the plants and trees had been annihilated.

[51:43] And also to the Thamud, who were told, “Enjoy yourselves for a while.”
The story of Prophet Sālih’s people, the Thamūd, is referenced in greater detail in other chapters. Here, it is only alluded to in passing: “Enjoy yourselves for a while.” In other words, let yourselves be distracted by this worldly life’s fleeting pleasures. Steeped insin and disobedience to God,they hunted down and killed the camel thatSālih had told them to letroam freelyand drink from where it desired.God sent this test to see whether they would respect the sanctity of just one thing. But they could not manage even this,and thus were utterly annihilated by the divine punishment, just like the ‘Ād. Adam and Eve were also tested in this way, for God told them to eat whatever they pleased in paradise, except for the fruit of the one tree they were forbidden to approach.That particular tree appears to have been a symbol for Satan’s web of deceit. It seems to be human nature that making something forbidden only makes people more determined to do it. This is a test of one’s willpower – namely, can you restrain yourself from engaging in just one thing?
After the Thamūd killed the camel, Sālih gave them three days to repent and make amends to God. Their refusal to do so and subsequent mockery of him resulted in: “Enjoy yourselves for a while.”

[51:44] They rebelled against the command of your Lord, so the thunderbolt seized them while they were looking on.

[51:45] They could not even remain standing, let alone defend themselves.
As anyone who has taken a science class knows, lightning occurs when the positive charge of storm clouds comes into contact with the Earth’s negative charge, which causes several thousand volts of electricity to be discharged into the ground. This discharge is so powerful that any tree that it strikes will burst into flames. If it strikes a person, they will almost certainly die instantaneously.

[51:46] Before that We destroyed the people of Noah: they were a wicked people(fāsiq).
Fisqmeans to violate the sanctity of something or act in any way that goes beyond the bounds ofhuman decency or transgresses the limits of the law.
Up to this point, the chapter has only briefly referred to past peoples, all of whom transgressed the bounds of human nature as laid down by God andsuffered the consequences for doing so. If we pay close attention, we can discern four types of punishment here, each of which corresponds to a fundamental element of nature: water, earth, fire, and air. Pharaoh and his soldiers, who depended on the Nile for their subsistence, were drowned in water. Egypt, like many other Middle Eastern countries, is characterized by scarce water supplies. The Nile is its jugular vein, a reality that helped ensure Pharaoh’s continued reign. When Moses called upon Pharaoh to believe in God, the latter responded: “Does not the kingdom of Egypt belong to me and these rivers that run at my feet?” (43:51).This ruler, who controlled the kingdom’s water resources and determined how they would be shared among the different cities and settlements, literally held the power of life and death over his subjects.Thus there is a poetic justice in how he and his armies were killed.
Meanwhile, the Qur’an describes the ‘Ād as possessing great physical strength – and yet the violent wind that buffeted their city left them lying on the ground like the trunks of trees that had been torn out of the ground. These paragons of power and might were laid low by the wind, destroyed in the manner they least expected.The Thamūdwere destroyed by the shock of a thunderclap. Lot’s people were buried under the torrent of volcanic earth, molten rock, and clouds of burning ash that rained down upon them. All of these people, who thought that they would enjoy a long life and imagined that no power could defeat them, were wiped off the face of the Earth by natural calamities and disasters.
Thefollowingverses shift to a new topic: the natural order.

[51:47] We built(banaynā-hā) the heavens with Our power and indeed extended them(mūsiʻūn).
Mūsiʻūnis a noun of state, which indicates a continuous state of affairs. Thus, the heavens are still expanding.Surely no one in pre-Islamic Arabia thought that this was the case, because this theory was only developed in the early 20th century through the pioneering work of scientists such as Albert Einstein and Edwin Hubble. Moreover,itwas the result of the many scientific advances madeover the centuries.Modern scientists discovered that the universe has no fixed limits and thus has been in a dynamic state of growth since it came into being. According to them, approximately 13.7 billion years ago the universe came into being due to the Big Bang, after which it rapidly expanded from a single point: a singularity. They have even managed to calculate what was happening at every tenth of a second at the beginning of that event. After the Big Bang, all that exists came into being from nothing –a claim that is presented as an uncontroversial fact instead of merely one of many theories. Moreover, various parts of the universe are still expanding moving further and further away from one another – just like a balloon that is still being inflated and thus growing bigger and bigger with each passing second. It is truly amazing to consider the scale of the universe and the speed with which it expanded; moving at almost the speed of light. In fact, by observing the light reaching us from distant stars, scientists candetermine the universe’s rate of expansion and how far away those stars are.
The expression banaynā-hā (We raised them) shows that the heavens came into being like a structure being raised from the ground up. The active mūsiʻ (to expand) indicates that God is perpetually engaged in this activity.

[51:48] And Earth we spread out(farsh).And how well We smoothed it out (māhid).
A farsh is something that you unroll, like a rug on the floor. Māhid, an active participle of mahd, means “a cradle.” In the distant past, our planet’s surface was a violent volcanic landscape. After being constantly struck by comets made of ice, its surface gradually cooled and was covered with water that spread out like a carpet in every direction.But even after this event, which took place millions of years ago, Earth’s surface was still being rocked by earthquakes and volcanos and thus remained completely unsuitable for life. But as the planet’s crust became less chaotic and mountains helped stabilize it, the world became a suitable home for humanity, just like a cradle in which you place a baby to sleep. In reality, Earth is the cradle of humanity.

[51:49] and We created pairs of all things so that you [people] might take note.
The previously unknown scientific discovery that everything has been created in pairs today needs no explanation. In fact, this duality extends all the way down to the sub-atomic level, where negative-charged electrons are paired with positive-charged protons, and all the way up to the cosmic level, where black holes are said to work in concert with the magnetic fields that surround them. However, life on Earth did not originally exist in male-female pairs – this occurred after millions of years of evolution, when X and Y chromosomes appeared in the plant kingdom and enabled evolution to acquire a new way to exchange genetic material within a species.
The system that governs the universe is truly marvelous to behold. Can one really believe that these binary pairs, upon which the world depends, simply came into existence due to blind chance or probability? Why does everything exist, in one way or another, as half of a pair that, when combined, produces new kinds of phenomena? Is there no plan behind this order? God urgesthose who are listening towake up, behold the careful arrangement of the world thatthey inhabit, and know that it must have a Creator and Sustainer: “That you might take note.”

[51:50] [So say to them, O Prophet], “Therefore, flee unto God. I am sent by Him to give you clear warning(indhār).
Indhārmeans to warn someone of an imminent danger. Interestingly, this verse tells people to flee from God and toward God, just as a child flees from its mother’s anger and punishment and toward her affection and care.
God invokes this contrast on numerous occasions,for instance: “Inform My servants that I am indeed the All-Forgiving, the All-Merciful and that My punishment is painful” (15:49-50). Notice here that “All-Forgiving” (ghafūr) and “All-Merciful” (rahīm) are both adjectives –they describe God directly –that intensify the meaning of their etymological roots:ghafūr(an abundance of forgiveness) and rahīm(an abundance of mercy). Meanwhile, “punishment” (adhāb) is not an adjective.The Qur’an neverrefers to God as a “punisher,”but merely says: “My punishment is painful.”Thus God’s primary goal is not to punish humanity, just as no good teacher enters a classroom with the intention of reprimanding or punishing the students, and no school is created to give its pupils failing grades on their exams.
On the contrary,this is simply the way that education works: Those students who do not study will fail their exams and be refused admittance to the next class. God’s punishment has two meanings: (1) failing the test and therefore beingunable to advance to the next grade,and (2) the educator has also failed to achieve his/hergoal, namely, the student’s development. Therefore, just as students must avoid whatever might hold them back, they must hold fast to whatever might help them progress, human beings must flee from God’s punishment and toward His forgiveness and mercy.
Given that human beings naturally seek to avoid risk, God reminds them that the Hereafter is no laughing matter. How can people remain indifferent when confronted by any threat of harm, let alone something that will determine their eternal destiny? Can they really ignore such a thing? But before they can flee from this supposed danger and seek refuge in God, they must understand exactly what it is.

[51:51] And do not set up any other god alongside Him(maʻ Allāh). I am sent by Him to give you clear warning.”
“Alongside God” (maʻ Allāh) means to accompany God. In other words, if you worship God you must not worship a prophet or a saint, your ego, or some other kind of actual or abstract idol. Only after abandoning all such things will you be a true monotheist. Prophets and Imams exist only to show us how to worship God properly.He uses these exemplars of how to know God and the best examples to follow in worshipping Him to guide us toward the truth. The Qur’an tells us to flee from an evil outcome and seek God’s protection: Do not associate anyone with God or make anything a partner to God.
Notice that the Qur’an says “alongside God” as opposed to “instead of God.”The reason for this deliberate wording is as follows: Doing a good deed only to realize some ulterior motive (e.g.,to attract other people’s notice, display your supposed virtue,or obtainsome benefit) is a kind of polytheism (shirk) because you are placing your own desires next to God. For example, people might do something that is pleasing to God, but at the same time hope to ensure or even promote their own interests, persuade others to give them a position of leadership and authority, orat the very least appreciate their value. If these hidden desires are not met, such peoplebecome resentful and leave. True monotheists only see God, whereas polytheists see God,themselves, and others. “I am sent by Him to give you clear warning” means exactly this.

[51:52] Similarly, no messenger came to those before them but they said [of him] in like manner, “A sorcerer or a crazy man.”

[51:53] Did they tell one another to do this? No! They are a people who exceed all bounds(tāghūn),
As the disbelievers from earlier nations who treated God’s prophets and messengers in this way were not contemporaries, they could not have conspired together or coordinated their efforts.So how can we to explain the fact that they all behaved in the same way? The answer is that one result of rebelling against God is to deny the truth. Tughyān (rebellion) literally means to overstep the bounds. The outcome is always the same:The rebels reject the truth and accuse God’s chosen messenger of being a crazy man or a magician.

[51:54] So turn away from them, [for]you are not to blame.
God tells the Prophet toturn away and ignore them when they blame him, for his only duty was to deliver the message. In verse 40 of this chapter, after Pharaoh and his soldiers had drowned, we read that Pharaoh was “was to blame”, meaning that he deserved to be blamed for his actions. Equally, when Jonah loses hope for his people and forsakes them, the Qur’an says: “Then the fish swallowed him while he was blameworthy” (37:142). Perhaps the Prophet also worried that if he turned his back on his faithless townspeople and left them that he would become worthy of God’s blame. This is why God tells him: “You are not to blame.”

[51:55] Continue to remind them, for reminding profits the believers.
As the Qur’an states: “So admonish, for admonition is indeed beneficial” (87:9). Of course this is trueonly when the audience is receptive to your message. If they do not want to listen to you, there is no use in admonishing them. The Prophet’s preaching and exhortations are only for those who are ready to hear the words of truth and pay attention to him.
In the next verse, God reveals the reason for humanity’s creation. Someone might well ask why He created us in the first place? What is the purpose of our life, with all its ups and downs? Why do some human beings attain the highest levels of nobility and virtue, like Abraham and the Prophet, who are exemplars for all of us, while others sink to the very depths of depravity? God answers:

[51:56] I created the jinn and humans(ins)only that they may do ‘ibādah of Me.
Jinn is an adjective and a noun of state, rather than a particular kind of being,just as “beautiful” is an adjective that refers to beautiful items, people, views, and works of art. Although nothing in the world bears the name of “beauty”or “ugly,” we cannot conceive of an “ugliness” that exists apart from ugly things. By the same token, ins refers to that which is ma’nūs (familiar) – something that we know, can see, are familiar with. By contrast, jinn refers to that which is hidden, unknown, and unfamiliar, namely, something beyond the bounds of our knowledge. Therefore,jinn encompasses a great many things. Dividing beings into ins and jinn is to divide them into known and unknown, familiar and unfamiliar.
In recent centuries, these words have been grossly misunderstood. In the early centuries of Islam, people better understood what these terms meant. For Arab Bedouins, whose entire life was their tribe and who knew nothing else of the world, the awesome expanse of the cosmos and the complexity of its inhabitants could be encapsulated in the binary terms of ins and jinn, or “seen” (shahādah) and “unseen” (ghayb). For example, the Qur’an proclaims that when Moses threw down his staff, it became a jānn (a synonym for and cognate of jinn). Elsewhere, it says that people were ajinna in their mothers’ bellies Ajinnah is the plural of janīn, another cognate of jinn, because the fetus is hidden in the mother’s womb. If you study all of these cognates, you will see this meaning of hiddenness present in all of them. For example, a garden is called jannah because its trees and greenery hide the ground. A shield is called a junnah because a person hides behind it from attack. A crazy man is called majnūn because his intellect is overwhelmed and thus “covered” by irrationality. Everything that lives underground is considered part of this category. The Qur’an also uses the cognate verb janna, meaning “to cover,” in the verse: “When night covered him” (fa lammā janna ‘alayhi al-layl), to describe the darkness covering Abraham and concealing everything from his sight.
The meaning of jinn is the same in this verse. It says that you people who know one another, share the same language, and live in the same vicinity, as well as those peoplewho you do not know, of whose existence you are unaware, whether they speak your language or not, whether they are alive now or will live in the future – all of you were created for one single purpose:li yaʻbudūn. Translations of the Qur’an usually render yaʻbud and its cognates as “worship” (and, therefore, the phrase: “to worship Me”). According to this adaptation, God created us only to worship Him. Is our God the kind of lord who needs servants and slaves to do his bidding? This is a perfect example of a translation that fails to convey the full depth of a text’s meaning and actually obscures it. In the years before the Iranian revolution, Dr. Ali Shariati often pointed out that ‘abbada al-tarīq actually meant to create a way or smooth a path for people to walk upon. This is why an asphalt road is calledtarīq al-muʻabbad, “a road that has been smoothed.” An improperly leveledroad will be rocky, uneven, crooked and, on the whole, unsuitable for use by people and vehicular traffic.
The figurative meaning of ‘ibādah in the Qur’an is to level one’s own being in such a way that it is ready to carry the caravan of the one true object of worship, to open the door of the heart so that it is ready to receive the illuminating light of God’s mercy. Therefore, li yaʻbudūn actually implies that people should direct their being only toward God and never toward the insinuations or temptations of Satan. We must be like sponges that absorb the water of God’s qualities and bring them into our own being.
Although we can never know God’s essence directly, the Qur’an describes His attributes in ways that we can understand.For example, God is All-Knowing (‘alīm), which alludes to the relation of our knowledge to His knowledge. God is All-Wise (hakīm), which suggests that we can and must learn from the divine wisdom. This is true for all of the attributes and names given to God. For example, the All-Forgiving (ghafūr), the All-Mighty (‘azīz), the Most-Merciful (rahīm), and the All-Merciful (rahmān). Believers must manifest God’s attributes of might and mercy by being confidentand possessing self-esteem while, at the same time, being kind and merciful to all creatures:“I created you for this. I did not create you to follow Satan and to pollute your being with his whisperings and urgings.” On the Day of Resurrection, God will ask: “Did I not exhort you, O Children of Adam, saying: ‘Do not do ‘ibādah of Satan. He is indeed your manifest enemy. Do ‘ibādah of Me. That is a straight path’”? (36:60-61).
Translating‘ibādah as “worship” renders the meaning of the verse as: “Do not worship Satan.” If this is our understanding of God’s injunction, we will say to ourselves: “Thank God we are not Satan-worshippers, so there is nothing for us to worry about.” But maybe we would be betteroff asking why God would adjure His servants to avoid worshipping Satan andwhy He even takes a pledge from them to this effect? If ‘ibādah here is “worship”and if He ever asks us if we worshipped Satan, we can respond confidently: “Heaven forbid! We never worshipped Satan.” However, if this is truly the case, why does this verse make it seem like the majority of people worship Satan? Given all of this, we contend that‘ibādahin this instance must carry the other meaning we highlighted above – that of opening oneself to and then surrendering to an outside force.This is the pledge that God is invoking.
Our God-given intellect serves as the guarantor of this pledge. Using your intellect, you can easily discern who has a hold over your being. Would you submit your being to your enemy? All reasonable people would seek protection from their enemy and look for ways to fight him. How does this enemy harm us? He harms us whenever we follow his bidding and listen to his suggestions, for this is the limit of his power.God reminds us that He has made a compact with us that we will only open yourselves to Him, that our being should only be filled with His qualities and attributes, not those of Satan. What does Satan represent other thanarrogance, his most important and harmful attribute? None of his other attributes come close to his supreme conceitedness, egotism, and self-aggrandizement. God enjoins us to submit ourselves to Him, the source of all goodness and virtue. On the other hand, Satan goads us to refuse and resist doing so. At least ten times a day we ask God to guide us to the straight path, the path of loving God, embodying His qualities, and rejecting Satan’s attempts to draw us closer to him.

[51:57] I seek no sustenance (rizq) from them, nor do I ask that they feed Me.
Razzāq is another adjective that intensifies the meaning of its etymological root (R-Z-Q), “the All-Provider” in the sense that all beings derive their subsistence from God. Therefore, He is self-sufficient in terms of sustenance and provision.

[51:58] God is the All-Sustainer, the Lord of Power, the Ever Strong (matīn).
God is “Ever Strong,” in the sense that He has unlimited power. Does such a being need any other being’s help? When one of God’s servants becomes an ‘abdby opening up to God, the divine attributes become realized through their becoming a source of goodness and assistance for others.

[51:59] Those who do wrong (dhunūb), like their predecessors, will have a share of punishment – they need not ask Me to hasten it.
Dhunūb is the plural of dhanb, which literally means a “tail” or “appendage.”Dhanb is used to denote a sin, because a sin is the result of a person’s error or misdeed, which leaves an imprint on their being. This is just like eating very fatty or sugary food, for doing so will have long-term effects on a person’s body and potentially prove detrimental in terms ofone’s health and general wellbeing – even to the point of contributing to an early death. In short, we live with the consequences of what we have consumed.Knowing this, why do we resist examining our soul, prodding our conscience, orseeking treatment for our hearts? Ali says that the Prophet was like “a physician roaming with his treatments,” a mobile physician who took his medicines with him wherever he went. Whatever we do in this world has consequences that outlast our deeds and even our lives. Since they trail behind us, we call them dhunūb. Even though we commonly render this word as “sin,” what we are really referring to are the negative effects of misdeeds that cling to us. Today we all apply for credit cards that allow us to borrow money more or less at whim. Upon receipt of our application form, the lending company will carry out a credit check, find out where we work, whether we pay ourbills on time, and whether we have taken out other loans or credit cards. In short, we will be put under the microscope. And yet we do not want to believe that God has His own method of scrutiny.The imprint of each of our misdeeds will only disappear after we right the wrong that we committed.
“Like their predecessors” means the effects of the deeds committed by the above-mentioned destroyed peoples. God says that such people will suffer the same consequences of their deeds, and the same fate thatbefell them will befall the wrongdoers of today and tomorrow.
Therefore, they should be patient instead of trying to hasten what God has in store for them. They taunt the Prophet: “Where is this punishment that you threatened us with? Why doesn’t it come already?” God directsthe Prophet totell them to not be so eager for it to come, for it will come at its designated time and they will suffer their fate.

[51:60] Woe then to those who deny the truth on the Day they have been promised.
Woe to those who hid and resisted the truth on the Day when this punishment will be implemented. Woe to those who disregarded the order of the cosmos and were blind to its realities. Woe to those on the Day on which they will be brought back to life for judgment.

Translator: Alexander Hainy (Khaleeli)
Editor: Hamid Mavani