1. When God’s help arrived, and victory,

2. And you saw people entering God’s religion in waves,

3. Then sing the praise of your Lord and seek His forgiveness. Indeed, He is ever accepting of repentance.

[110:1] When God’s help arrived, and victory,

The verse begins with the particle idhā (إِذَا), which signifies a conditional statement: God’s help does not come at all times. He sent prophets and messengers, all of whom experienced hardship, injury, and persecution. The Prophet suffered greatly during his 13 years of calling people to Islam in Makkah. During the battles his head was injured and one of his teeth broke. Many of his faithful Companions were persecuted; some died under torture and the rest eventually migrated to Yathrib (later known as Madinah) with the Prophet, thereby losing their homes and belongings.

Why did God allow them to be harmed? Did He not want His Prophet to succeed? There are other ways of asking the same question. The other day someone was saying, “When I see what happens on a daily basis, I wonder if there truly is a God because if there was one then people would not commit errors and sins.” These folks imagine that God is standing by keeping an eye on us so that we will not do such things, that He is watching over the faithful like a mother looking after her spoiled children so that no harm will befall them. When did God ever promise to do such a thing? The deniers ask, “When will God’s promise of help arrive?” It arrives whenever it is time for it to arrive.

This conditional statement indicates that God’s help will come only if you help God. “If you help God, then He will help you” (47:7).Since God has no need for our help, “helping God” means helping His “servants” (‘abd; devotees) and advancing His message. Lazy, timid, and self-indulgent people who do not help others should expect no help in return. Qur’an 22:40 states: “God is sure to help those who help His cause.”

We notice several facts here. First, this is a mutual relationship because those who sacrifice in the cause of truth and give abundantly will receive divine support. Second, we help God in the form of helping His messengers and the faithful.Just like Jesus’ disciples, who readily responded to his plea, “We shall be God’s helpers” (61:14), assisting God means helping, protecting, and supporting the messengers and the faithful. Third, the condition for receiving this help is to participate in defensive battles to remove obstacles in the way of promoting His cause. That is, if the enemies attack you: “Fight them: God will punish them at your hands. He will disgrace them and help you conquer them”(9:14).

Fourth, God’s help is bestowed after enduring periods of difficulty. In other words, His help does not come as soon as people stand up against injustice and thus they should not complain right at the outset, “We struggled in His way, so why does He not help us?” That is not how it works, for one must first endure and undergo whatever He wills in terms of time and hardship. God’s help is not separate from our being, for it flourishes from within, not from without.

Fifth, God’s help is a definite and permanent decree, as opposed to being available only while the Prophet was alive. Qur’an 40:51 proclaims: “We support Our messengers and the believers in the present life and on the Day when the witnesses arise”and then in 30:47:“We make it Our duty to help the believers.”Thus the faithful will always be helped, but not simply because they proclaim themselves to be “faithful.”

Sixth, how does God provide help? Do a group of angels descend and fight alongside the faithful? As pointed out, God’s help is an internal element of our being that strengthens our morale: “It is He who made His tranquility descend into the hearts of the believers” (48:4). This internal tranquility was manifested during the battles of Badr and Uhud,for God bestowed it upon the Muslims and strengthened their hearts when they seemed to be losing.

Qur’an 3:126 proclaims:“A message of hope for you [believers] to put your hearts at rest – help comes only from God.”So no angels or other creatures descended to fight the unbelievers. Rather, God’s help emanated from within the believers as their potentialities became actualized. Those who might have been afraid of being slapped in the face now fought against 100 men without fear. This explanation can easily lead to a long and detailed discussion. Suffice it to say that consensus has been reached that “God’s help arrived, and victory”refers to the Prophet’s successful conquest of Makkah, the focal point of the Arabian Peninsula and home of the all-important Ka‘bah.

[110:2] And you saw people entering God’s religion in waves,

[110:3] Then sing the praise of your Lord and seek His forgiveness. Indeed, He is ever accepting of repentance.

A few questions need to be answered. What caused the people to enter God’s religion in droves? At the time of such a resounding victory, why did the Prophet have to ask God for forgiveness? Generally, those who have emerged victorious at the end of a long and difficult ordeal or finished years of difficult studies are not expected to ask for forgiveness. Indeed, they are to be congratulated.

At the beginning of the prophetic mission there were only a few Muslims. Even though they were of high caliber and did things efficiently, their failure to gain new converts and tribal support far outweighed their successes. At the time of their migration from Makkah to Madinah, their numbers did not exceed one hundred. They also had to endure many difficult and challenging years.

Consider the 1979 revolution in Iran. The total number of political activists who had a hand in moving it forward over the years was no more than about 3,000 individuals, some of whom had served jail terms. All of the political revolutionaries, as well as those who died in skirmishes or were executed, numbered no more than 330 to 340 persons. A list of their names was later published. All of these are accepted statistics. So how is it that when the revolution finally gathered momentum, millions participated in it?

Clearly, a movement gains momentum once it reaches a tipping point and a decisive moment. The events that happened at the onset of Islam were similar to what we have seen in our lifetime, when people came in droves. Remember that at the Prophet’s time people were not really into reading and research; rather, they were ruled by the established social norms and tribal laws. The chief declared war or peace, and everyone honored his decision, for it was just this type of discipline that held each tribe and clan together. After the Prophet conquered Makkah, these chiefs accepted Islam and all members followed suit. Of course they had not yet been trained in Islamic doctrine and practice, but at least now they would no longer fight the Muslims. That is when this verse was revealed.

The late Ayatollah Tāleghānīsays that “praise” (tasbīh) has three or four stages. Many verses say to give praise (i.e., to accept that God has no deficiencies, shortcomings, defects, or faults) and to consider Him to be pure, infallible, and transcendent. If one had previously asked, “What God? If there were one, surely He would not let the believers be tortured and killed,” now says, “God is pure, infallible, and transcendent” and thus cannot possibly have any faults. Today we hear people wondering what kind of world we are living in, why there are so many poor and miserable people, why one person is born paralyzed and another one is born blind. Why is this? What kind of divine justice is this?

In our world, some are billionaires among a vast number of destitute people. Powerful countries pillage and plunder the world’s people. See how many innocent human beings die in the ensuing wars. Some see all of this and conclude that there is no God, because surely He would have prevented such evils and injustice. What kind of justice is it when one is beautiful and another is not, when one is rich and another is not? Why is someone born with a disease? What fault do these people have? Therefore, there cannot be justice in this world. They only see the outward appearance and are making a judgment based on that.

The verse says that after seeing all of this, celebrate. This is one of the stages of praise. Employees may consider their supervisors efficient and effective but, due to personal issues, may have little or nothing good to say about them. Celebrating the praise means that you really worship God and develop a longing for Him. This is a natural progression: praise, praise to the Lord, praise to the Lord Who is the Provider and Sustainer, and, finally, praise to the greatness of His lordship. All of these involve recognizing the purity and infallibility of the divine order. Thus we develop a feeling of praise, reverence, awe, and gradually come to realize God’s greatness and grandeur.

Why does God command the Prophet to ask for forgiveness here and in three other places? And why does He tell the other messengers and prophets to do so as well? The answer is that only God is absolute, perfect, and without deficiency. God’s relationship with His close devotees and expectations of them are not the same as those He holds for others. For instance, young children enjoy a lot of leeway, which is gradually curtailed as they mature and grow older, for their parents’ expectations of them change. For example, they may punish their son for not phoning to let them know that he would be late or their daughter for going out with her friends without telling them. God evaluates the prophets by a different set of criteria, for they are the community’s most mature and intelligent adults. Thus He has far higher expectations of them than he does for “regular” people like you and me. For this reason, the Prophet said, “Any act accepted as a good deed from a pious and highly righteous person would be considered sinful if performed by one who is nearest to God.”

In the battle of the Trench (Khandaq) or Confederation (Ahzāb) in 627, the situation had become so desperate that: “They were so shaken that even [their] Messenger and the believers with him cried, ‘When will God’s help arrive?’ Truly, God’s help is near” (2:214).This is a “failing” because God does not expect His Prophet to wonder, even for a moment, about when His help will arrive even as he sees his Companions being killed one by one. This is why God instructs him to seek forgiveness for his vulnerabilities, now that he can see the people entering God’s religion in waves.

“Truly, God’s help is near.”The implication of asking God “when” is that God is unaware of our situation and that we are trying to attract His attention so that He will do something about it. Thus we are actually meddling in God’s affairs.

Alisays, “If you are unhappy with God’s will, select another god. If you are not satisfied with this Lord, select another one. If you think that this God is too difficult to obey, does not make sound judgments, or is too harsh, severe, and merciless and does not attend to you as you expect, then go and choose another god. Indeed, you can resign from being His ‘servant’ (‘abd) [or devotee].” Such complaining and dissatisfaction suggests that we are wiser than God.

People can reach the point when they realize that only beauty comes from God. In other words, they will acknowledge that while they “know” what is good for them, God knows better, and that they spiritually grow in ways that are unknown to them. The Prophet was told four or five times, as were the earlier prophets: “Wait patiently [Oh Prophet] for your Lord’s judgment. Do not be like the man [Jonah] in the whale who called out in distress” (68:48).Do not be like Jonah, Oh Prophet, that impatient man who became angry and left (37:140). I know that you are offended and upset by their words, but “If you find rejection by the disbelievers so hard to bear, then seek a tunnel into the ground or a ladder into the sky, if you can, and bring them a sign. God could bring them all to guidance if it were His will, so do not join the ignorant” (6:35).

God says that they are His “servants” and that He has given them the choice to accept or reject His laws. If He willed, He could relieve Satanfrom his duties for a while and obliterate all sin. But that is not His will; rather, it is part of the order and discipline of His laws that people choose their own way. Each individual can descend to the lowest of the low (asfalu sāfilīn [9:40]) or ascend to the highest of the high (a‘lā ‘iliyyīn). If these stations did not exist, attaining perfection would be impossible. In other words: “Seek His forgiveness. Indeed, He always accepts repentance.”

God says that He has endowed us with two potentialities: to ascend to the high levels by virtue and piety – even to reach the highest level by faith and good deeds – or to descend to the lowest of the low; to choose piety or debauchery, monotheism or polytheism.

Translator: Amir Douraghy
Editor: Hamid Mavani