Tafsir al-Jalalayn

O Prophet! Why do you prohibit what God has made lawful for you in terms of your Coptic handmaiden Māriya — when he lay with her in the house of Hafsa who had been away but who upon returning and finding out became upset by the fact that this had taken place in her own house and on her own bed — by saying ‘She is unlawful for me!’ seeking by making her unlawful for you to please your wives? And God is Forgiving Merciful having forgiven you this prohibition.

Verily God has prescribed He has made lawful for you when necessary the absolution of your oaths to absolve them by expiation as mentioned in the sūrat al-Mā’ida Q. 589 and the forbidding of sexual relations with a handmaiden counts as an oath so did the Prophet s expiate? Muqātil b. Sulaymān said ‘He set free a slave in expiation for his prohibition of Māriya’; whereas al-Hasan al-Basrī said ‘He never expiated because the Prophet s has been forgiven all errors’. And God is your Protector your Helper and He is the Knower the Wise.

And mention when the Prophet confided to one of his wives namely Hafsa a certain matter which was his prohibition of Māriya telling her ‘Do not reveal it!’; but when she divulged it to ‘Ā’isha reckoning there to be no blame in doing such a thing and God apprised him He informed him of it of what had been divulged he announced part of it to Hafsa and passed over part out of graciousness on his part. So when he told her about it she said ‘Who told you this?’ He said ‘I was told by the Knower the Aware’ namely God.

If the two of you namely Hafsa and ‘Ā’isha repent to God … for your hearts were certainly inclined towards the prohibition of Māriya that is to say your keeping this secret despite knowing the Prophet’s s dislike of it which is itself a sin the response to the conditional ‘if the two of you repent to God’ has been omitted to be understood as ‘it will be accepted of both of you’; the use of the plural qulūb ‘hearts’ instead of the dual qalbayn ‘both your hearts’ is on account of the cumbersomeness of putting two duals together in what is effectively the same word; and if you support one another tazzāharā the original second tā’ of tatazāharā has been assimilated with the zā’; a variant reading has it without this assimilation tazāharā against him that is the Prophet in what he is averse to then know that God He huwa a pronoun for separation is indeed his Protector His supporter and Gabriel and the righteous among the believers Abū Bakr and ‘Umar may God be pleased with both of them wa-Jibrīlu wa-sālihu’l-mu’minīna is a supplement to the syntactical locus of the subject of inna sc. ‘God’ who will also be his supporters and the angels furthermore further to the support of God and those mentioned are his supporters assistants of his in supporting him to prevail over both of you.

It may be that if he divorces you that is if the Prophet divorces his wives his Lord will give him in your stead read yubaddilahu or yubdilahu wives better than you azwājan khayran minkunna is the predicate of ‘asā ‘it may be’ the sentence being the response to the conditional — the replacement of his wives by God never took place because the condition of his divorcing them never arose — women submissive to God affirming Islam believing faithful obedient penitent devout given to fasting — or given to emigrating in God’s way — previously married and virgins.

O you who believe! Guard yourselves and your families by enjoining obedience to God against a Fire whose fuel is disbelieving people and stones such as those idols of theirs made of that stone — the meaning is that it is extremely hot fuelled by the above-mentioned unlike the fire of this world which is fuelled by wood and the like — over which stand angels its keepers — numbering nineteen as will be stated in sūrat al-Muddaththir Q. 7430 — stern a sternness of the heart mighty in their power of assault who do not disobey God in what He commands them mā amarahum is a substitution for His Majesty ‘God’ in other words they do not disobey the command of God but do what they are commanded — this is reiterated for emphasis; the verse is meant as a threat to deter believers from apostatising and for hypocrites who believe only with their tongues and not with their hearts.

‘O you who disbelieve! Do not make any excuses today — this is said to them upon their entering the Fire — in other words because this excusing will be of no use to you. You are only being requited for what you used to do’ that is only the due requital thereof.

O you who believe! Repent to God with sincere repentance read nasūhan or nusūhan a truthful repentance so that one does not return to committing that sin again nor have the desire to return to it. It may be that your Lord ‘asā an expression denoting ‘a hope’ that will be realised will absolve you of your misdeeds and admit you into gardens orchards underneath which rivers flow on the day when God will not let down by admitting into the Fire the Prophet and those who believe with him. Their light will be running before them in front of them and it will be on their right. They will say yaqūlūna this denotes the beginning of a new syntactically independent sentence ‘Our Lord! Perfect our light for us towards Paradise — whereas the hypocrites their light will be extinguished — and forgive us Our Lord. Assuredly You have power over all things’.

O Prophet! Struggle against the disbelievers with the sword and the hypocrites by the tongue and with argument and be stern with them in rebuke and hatred. For their abode will be Hell — and what an evil journey’s end! it is.

God has struck a similitude for those who disbelieve the wife of Noah and the wife of Lot. They were under two of Our righteous servants yet they betrayed them in their religion for they both disbelieved — Noah’s wife called Wāhila used to say to his people that he was a madman while Lot’s wife called Wā‘ila used to tell his people the whereabouts of his guests when they stayed with him at night by lighting a fire and during the day by making smoke. So they that is Noah and Lot did not avail the two women in any way against God against His chastisement and it was said to the two women ‘Enter both of you the Fire along with the incomers’ from among the disbelievers of the peoples of Noah and Lot.

And God has struck a similitude for those who believe the wife of Pharaoh — she believed in Moses her name was Āsiya; Pharaoh chastised her by tying her hands and feet to pegs and placing a huge millstone on her chest and having her laid out in the sun; but when those in charge of her would leave her the angels would come to shade her — when she said during her torture ‘My Lord build for me a home near You in Paradise — so He disclosed for her a veil of the Unseen and she saw it which in turn alleviated for her the torture — and deliver me from Pharaoh and his work his torture and deliver me from the evildoing folk’ the followers of his Pharaoh’s religion whereat God took unto Himself her spirit in death. Ibn Kaysān said ‘She was raised to Paradise alive where she eats and drinks’.

And Mary wa-Maryama is a supplement to imra’ata Fir‘awna daughter of ‘Imrān who preserved the chastity of her womb so We breathed into it of Our Spirit namely Gabriel — when he breathed into the opening of her shirt by God’s creation of this action of his which reached her womb thus conceiving Jesus — and she confirmed the words of her Lord His prescriptions and His revealed Scriptures and she was of the obedient one of the obedient folk.