Tafsīr al-Qurʾān al-ʿAẓīm, by Abū al-Fidāʾ Ismāʿīl ibn ʿUmar ibn Kathīr (d. 774 AH / 1373 CE). The most read of the commentaries by ḥadīth, which explains the Qur’an by the Qur’an, then by the Prophet’s words, then by the Companions, and weighs the chains it cites.
Part 2 of 2: the commentary on The family of ʿImrān (3:33-64). The parts follow the order of the verses; this one covers 3:59-63 to 3:64.
On 3:59-63
He, Exalted, says: Surely the likeness of Jesus with God (3:59)—in the power of God, Exalted, in that He created him without a father—is as the likeness of Adam (3:59), for God, Exalted, created him without father or mother; rather, He created him from dust, then said to him “Be”, and he was (3:59). And He who created Adam is able to create Jesus with all the greater and more fitting reason; and if the claim of sonship in the case of Jesus were admissible on account of his having been created without a father, then its admissibility in the case of Adam would follow with greater reason—and it is known by agreement that that is false; so the claim of it in the case of Jesus is more gravely false and more manifestly corrupt. But the Lord, Mighty and Majestic, wished to display His power to His creation when He created Adam from neither male nor female, created Eve from a male without a female, and created Jesus from a female without a male, just as He created the rest of creation from male and female. For this reason He, Exalted, said in Sūrat Maryam: and that We may make him a sign for mankind (19:21).
And He said here: The truth is from your Lord, so do not be among the doubters (3:60), that is: this statement is the truth concerning Jesus, from which there is no escape and apart from which nothing is sound; and what is there after the truth but error?
Then He, Exalted, said—commanding His Messenger (peace and blessings be upon him) to engage in mutual imprecation (mubāhalah) with whoever obstinately opposed the truth in the matter of Jesus after the clear exposition had appeared: So whoever disputes with you concerning him after the knowledge that has come to you, say: Come, let us call our sons and your sons, our women and your women, ourselves and yourselves (3:61), that is: we bring them to be present at the time of the imprecation, then let us pray humbly and invoke the curse of God upon the liars (3:61), that is: let us invoke a curse upon one another, and invoke the curse of God upon the liars (3:61), that is: whether from among us or from among you.
The occasion of the revelation of this imprecation, and of what precedes it from the beginning of the sūrah up to this point, was the delegation of Najrān: when the Christians arrived they began to dispute concerning Jesus and to claim about him what they claim of sonship and divinity, so God sent down the opening part of this sūrah in refutation of them, as the Imām Muḥammad ibn Isḥāq ibn Yasār and others have mentioned.
Ibn Isḥāq said in his famous Sīrah, and others also said: The delegation of the Christians of Najrān came to the Messenger of God (peace and blessings be upon him), sixty riders, among them fourteen men of their nobles to whom their affairs were referred, namely: al-ʿĀqib, whose name was ʿAbd al-Masīḥ; al-Sayyid, who was al-Ayham; Abū Ḥārithah ibn ʿAlqamah, the brother of Bakr ibn Wāʾil1; Uways al-Ḥārith; Zayd; Qays; Yazīd; Nabīh; Khuwaylid; ʿAmr; Khālid; ʿAbd Allāh; and Yuḥannas.
The affairs of these men were referred to three of them: al-ʿĀqib, who was the commander of the people, the man of their counsel and the master of their deliberation, from whose opinion alone they would proceed; al-Sayyid, who was their scholar and the master of their journeying and their assembly; and Abū Ḥārithah ibn ʿAlqamah, who was their bishop, their learned man, their leader and the master of their schools. He was a man of the Arabs, of Banū Bakr ibn Wāʾil, but he had become a Christian, and the Romans and their kings honoured him and ennobled him, built churches for him, endowed him with wealth and gave him servants, because of what they knew of his firmness in their religion. He knew well the matter of the Messenger of God (peace and blessings be upon him), his affair and his description, from what he had learned from the earlier scriptures, but his ignorance carried him on to persist in Christianity because of the honour he saw accorded to him in it and his standing among its people.
Ibn Isḥāq said: Muḥammad ibn Jaʿfar ibn al-Zubayr related to me, saying: They came to the Messenger of God (peace and blessings be upon him) in Medina and entered upon him in his mosque when he had prayed the afternoon prayer, wearing garments of striped Yemeni cloth (ḥibarāt), cloaks and mantles, with the handsome bearing of the men of Banū al-Ḥārith ibn Kaʿb. He said: Some of the Companions of the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) who saw them would say: We never saw after them a delegation like them. The time of their prayer came, and they stood up in the mosque of the Messenger of God (peace and blessings be upon him) to pray, and the Messenger of God (peace and blessings be upon him) said: Leave them. So they prayed towards the east.
He said: Those of them who spoke with the Messenger of God (peace and blessings be upon him) were Abū Ḥārithah ibn ʿAlqamah, and al-ʿĀqib ʿAbd al-Masīḥ, or al-Sayyid al-Ayham. They were, among the Christians, upon the religion of the king, though their doctrine was divided: they say: he is God; and they say: he is the son of God; and they say: he is the third of three—exalted is God far above that in great exaltation. Such is the doctrine of Christianity. They argue for their saying “he is God” by the fact that he used to revive the dead, cure the sick, tell of unseen things, and create from clay the shape of a bird and then breathe into it so that it became a bird—all of which was by the command of God, and that He might make him a sign for mankind.
They argue for their saying that he is the son of God, saying: he had no known father, and he spoke in the cradle with something no child of Adam before him had done.
They argue for their saying that he is the third of three by the saying of God, Exalted: We did, We commanded, We created, We decreed; so they say: if He were one, He would only have said: I did, I decreed, I commanded, I created; but it is He, and Jesus, and Mary. Concerning all of these sayings of theirs the Qur’an came down.
When the two learned men spoke to him, the Messenger of God (peace and blessings be upon him) said to them: “Submit, you two.” They said: We have submitted. He said: “You have not submitted, so submit.” They said: Yes indeed, we submitted before you. He said: “You lie. What prevents you two from submission is your claiming a son for God, your worship of the cross, and your eating of swine.” They said: Then who is his father, O Muḥammad? The Messenger of God (peace and blessings be upon him) kept silent before them and did not answer them, and God sent down concerning that—their sayings and the division of their doctrine—the opening part of Sūrat Āl ʿImrān up to eighty-odd verses of it.
Then Ibn Isḥāq spoke on the interpretation, until he said: When there came to the Messenger of God (peace and blessings be upon him) the tidings from God and the decisive judgement between him and them, and he was commanded, as he was commanded, to engage in mutual cursing with them if they rejected that from him, he called them to it. They said: O Abū al-Qāsim, let us look into our affair, then we will come to you with what we wish to do concerning what you have called us to. So they departed from him and then withdrew in private with al-ʿĀqib, who was the man of their counsel, and said: O ʿAbd al-Masīḥ, what is your view? He said: By God, O company of Christians, you know full well that Muḥammad is a prophet sent, and he has brought you the decisive word concerning the affair of your master; and you know that no people ever cursed a prophet and their elder survived or their young one grew up. It would surely be extermination for you if you did it. So if you refuse anything but attachment to your religion and remaining upon what you hold concerning your master, then make peace with the man and return to your country.
So they came to the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) and said: O Abū al-Qāsim, we have decided not to curse you; we leave you upon your religion and return to our religion. But send with us a man from among your companions whom you approve for us, to judge between us in matters of our property in which we have differed, for you are acceptable to us.
Muḥammad ibn Jaʿfar said: The Messenger of God (peace and blessings be upon him) said: “Come to me in the evening and I shall send with you the strong and trustworthy one.” ʿUmar ibn al-Khaṭṭāb used to say: I never loved command as I loved it that day, hoping that I might be the one. So I went out to the noon prayer in the heat of midday, and when the Messenger of God (peace and blessings be upon him) had prayed the noon prayer he gave the salutation, then looked to his right and to his left, and I began to stretch myself up so that he might see me; but he kept searching with his gaze until he saw Abū ʿUbaydah ibn al-Jarrāḥ, and he called him: “Go out with them and judge between them with truth in what they have differed over.” ʿUmar said: So Abū ʿUbaydah (may God be pleased with him) went off with it.
Ibn Mardawayh related, by way of Muḥammad ibn Isḥāq, from ʿĀṣim ibn ʿUmar ibn Qatādah, from Maḥmūd ibn Labīd, from Rāfiʿ ibn Khadīj, that the delegation of the people of Najrān came to the Messenger of God (peace and blessings be upon him)—and he mentioned the like of it, except that he said of the nobles: they were twelve. And he mentioned the rest of it at greater length than this account, with other additions.
Al-Bukhārī said: ʿAbbās ibn al-Ḥusayn related to us: Yaḥyā ibn Ādam related to us, from Isrāʾīl, from Abū Isḥāq, from Ṣilah ibn Zufar, from Ḥudhayfah, who said: Al-ʿĀqib and al-Sayyid, the two chiefs of Najrān, came to the Messenger of God (peace and blessings be upon him) intending to engage in mutual cursing with him. He said: One of them said to his companion: Do not do it, for by God, if he is a prophet and we curse him, neither we nor our descendants after us will prosper. They said: We will give you what you have asked of us; so send with us a trustworthy man, and send with us none but a trustworthy man. He said: “I shall surely send with you a trustworthy man, truly trustworthy.” The Companions of the Messenger of God (peace and blessings be upon him) craned forward for it, and he said: “Stand up, Abū ʿUbaydah ibn al-Jarrāḥ.” When he stood, the Messenger of God (peace and blessings be upon him) said: “This is the trustee of this community.”
Al-Bukhārī also related it, as did Muslim, al-Tirmidhī, al-Nasāʾī and Ibn Mājah, by several routes from Abū Isḥāq al-Sabīʿī, from Ṣilah, from Ḥudhayfah, in like terms.
Aḥmad, al-Nasāʾī and Ibn Mājah related it from the ḥadīth of Isrāʾīl, from Abū Isḥāq, from Ṣilah, from Ibn Masʿūd, in like terms.
Al-Bukhārī said: Abū al-Walīd related to us: Shuʿbah related to us, from Khālid, from Abū Qilābah, from Anas, from the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him), who said: “Every community has a trustee, and the trustee of this community is Abū ʿUbaydah ibn al-Jarrāḥ.”
The Imām Aḥmad said: Ismāʿīl ibn Yazīd al-Raqqī Abū Yazīd related to us: Furāt related to us, from ʿAbd al-Karīm ibn Mālik al-Jazarī, from ʿIkrimah, from Ibn ʿAbbās, who said: Abū Jahl said: If I see the Messenger of God (peace and blessings be upon him) praying at the Kaʿbah, I shall surely go to him and tread upon his neck. He said: So he said: “Had he done so, the angels would have seized him before all eyes; and had the Jews wished for death, they would have died and seen their seats in the Fire; and had those who were to engage in mutual cursing with the Messenger of God (peace and blessings be upon him) gone out, they would have returned to find neither property nor family.”
Al-Tirmidhī and al-Nasāʾī related it from the ḥadīth of ʿAbd al-Razzāq, from Maʿmar, from ʿAbd al-Karīm, with the same chain. Al-Tirmidhī said: a good, sound ḥadīth (ḥasan ṣaḥīḥ).
Al-Bayhaqī related in Dalāʾil al-nubuwwah the story of the delegation of Najrān at very great length; let us mention it, for it contains many benefits, and it contains some singularity, and it is pertinent to this context. Al-Bayhaqī said:
Abū ʿAbd Allāh al-Ḥāfiẓ and Abū Saʿīd Muḥammad ibn Mūsā ibn al-Faḍl related to us; they both said: Abū al-ʿAbbās Muḥammad ibn Yaʿqūb related to us: Aḥmad ibn ʿAbd al-Jabbār related to us: Yūnus ibn Bukayr related to us, from Salamah ibn ʿAbd Yasūʿ, from his father, from his grandfather—Yūnus said: and he had been a Christian and then became a Muslim—that the Messenger of God (peace and blessings be upon him) wrote to the people of Najrān, before Ṭā Sīn Sulaymān was sent down to him2: “In the name of the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. From Muḥammad the Prophet, the Messenger of God, to the bishop of Najrān and the people of Najrān: peace be upon you. I praise to you the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. To proceed: I call you to the worship of God in place of the worship of servants, and I call you to the guardianship of God in place of the guardianship of servants. If you refuse, then the poll-tax (jizyah); and if you refuse, I give you notice of war. And peace.”
When the letter came to the bishop and he read it, he was appalled by it, and it alarmed him with a severe alarm. He sent for a man of the people of Najrān called Shuraḥbīl ibn Wadāʿah—he was of Hamdān, and no one was summoned before him when a difficult matter arose, neither al-Ayham nor al-Sayyid nor al-ʿĀqib. The bishop handed the letter of the Messenger of God (peace and blessings be upon him) to Shuraḥbīl, and he read it. The bishop said: O Abū Maryam, what is your view? Shuraḥbīl said: You know what God promised Abraham concerning prophethood in the progeny of Ishmael; so what guarantees that this is not that very man? I have no opinion in the matter of prophethood; had it been a matter of worldly affairs, I would have counselled you with my opinion on it and exerted myself for you. The bishop said to him: Step aside and sit. So Shuraḥbīl stepped aside and sat to one side. Then the bishop sent for a man of the people of Najrān called ʿAbd Allāh ibn Shuraḥbīl, who was of Dhū Aṣbaḥ of Ḥimyar, and had him read the letter and asked him his opinion on it, and he said to him the like of what Shuraḥbīl had said. The bishop said to him: Then sit; so he stepped aside and sat to one side. Then the bishop sent for a man of the people of Najrān called Jabbār ibn Fayḍ, of Banū al-Ḥārith ibn Kaʿb, one of Banū al-Ḥamās, and had him read the letter and asked him his opinion on it, and he said to him the like of what Shuraḥbīl and ʿAbd Allāh had said; so the bishop ordered him, and he stepped aside and sat to one side.
When their opinion had all agreed upon that statement, the bishop ordered the bell (nāqūs) to be struck, and the fires were raised and the sackcloths in the cells—for that is what they used to do when they were alarmed by day; and when their alarm was by night they would strike the bell and raise the fires in the cells. So, when the bell was struck and the sackcloths raised, the people of the valley gathered, its upper part and its lower—and the length of the valley was a day’s journey for a swift rider, and in it were seventy-three villages and one hundred and twenty thousand fighting men. He read to them the letter of the Messenger of God (peace and blessings be upon him) and asked them their opinion on it, and the opinion of the men of counsel among them agreed that they should send Shuraḥbīl ibn Wadāʿah al-Hamdānī, ʿAbd Allāh ibn Shuraḥbīl al-Aṣbaḥī and Jabbār ibn Fayḍ al-Ḥārithī, to bring them news of the Messenger of God (peace and blessings be upon him). So the delegation set out, and when they were in Medina they put off their travelling clothes and put on robes of theirs of striped Yemeni cloth which they trailed behind them, and gold rings; then they went on until they came to the Messenger of God (peace and blessings be upon him) and greeted him, but he did not return their greeting. They sought to engage him in speech for a long part of the day, but he did not speak to them while they were wearing those robes and gold rings. So they went off seeking ʿUthmān ibn ʿAffān and ʿAbd al-Raḥmān ibn ʿAwf, who were acquaintances of theirs, and found them among a group of the Emigrants and the Helpers in a gathering, and said: O ʿUthmān and O ʿAbd al-Raḥmān, your Prophet wrote us a letter, and we came in response to him; we came to him and greeted him, but he did not return our greeting, and we sought to engage him in speech for a long part of the day, but it wearied us that he would not speak to us. What is your counsel, do you think we should go back? The two of them said to ʿAlī ibn Abī Ṭālib, who was among the people: What do you think, O Abū al-Ḥasan, about these people? ʿAlī said to ʿUthmān and ʿAbd al-Raḥmān: I think they should put off these robes of theirs and their rings and put on their travelling clothes, and then return to him. They did so and greeted him, and he returned their greeting; then he said: “By Him who sent me with the truth, they came to me the first time and Iblīs was with them.” Then he questioned them and they questioned him, and the questioning went on between him and them until they said: What do you say about Jesus? For we are returning to our people, and we are Christians; it would please us, if you are a prophet, to hear what you say about him. The Messenger of God (peace and blessings be upon him) said: “I have nothing about him this day of mine; so stay until I inform you of what my Lord says to me about Jesus.” The next morning came, and God, Mighty and Majestic, had sent down this verse: Surely the likeness of Jesus with God is as the likeness of Adam; He created him from dust, then said to him “Be”, and he was. The truth is from your Lord, so do not be among the doubters. So whoever disputes with you concerning him after the knowledge that has come to you, say: Come, let us call our sons and your sons, our women and your women, ourselves and yourselves, then let us pray humbly and invoke the curse of God upon the liars (3:59-61). But they refused to acknowledge that. So when the Messenger of God (peace and blessings be upon him) rose the next morning, after he had informed them of the tidings, he came forward wrapping al-Ḥasan and al-Ḥusayn in a cloak (khamīl) of his, with Fāṭimah walking behind his back, for the mutual cursing—and he had at that time several wives. Shuraḥbīl said to his two companions: You both know that when the valley gathers, its upper part and its lower, they neither come nor go except upon my opinion; and by God, I see a grave matter. By God, if this man is a king who has been sent forth, and we are the first of the Arabs to stab him in the eyes3 and reject his command, it will not leave his breast nor the breasts of his companions until they strike us with a calamity—and we are the nearest of the Arabs to them as neighbours. And if this man is a prophet sent, and we curse him, there will not remain on the face of the earth a hair or a nail of us but will perish. His two companions said to him: O Abū Maryam, then what is your counsel? He said: I think I should make him arbiter, for I see a man who will never judge unjustly. They said to him: You and that be it. He said: So Shuraḥbīl met the Messenger of God (peace and blessings be upon him) and said to him: I have found something better than cursing you. He said: “And what is it?” He said: Your judgement, today until nightfall and your night until morning; whatever you decree concerning us shall be binding. The Messenger of God (peace and blessings be upon him) said: “Perhaps there is someone behind you who will reproach you?” Shuraḥbīl said: Ask my two companions. He asked them and they said: The valley neither comes nor goes except upon the opinion of Shuraḥbīl. So the Messenger of God (peace and blessings be upon him) went back and did not curse them, until, when the next day came, they came to him and he wrote for them this document: “In the name of God, the Compassionate, the Merciful. This is what Muḥammad the Prophet, the Messenger of God, has written for Najrān—since his judgement was binding upon them—concerning every fruit, and every yellow and white and black thing, and slaves held in surplus by them: all of that is left to them in return for two thousand robes, in every Rajab a thousand robes and in every Ṣafar a thousand robes.” And he mentioned the rest of the conditions and the remainder of the account.
The point is that their delegation came in the year nine, because al-Zuhrī said: The people of Najrān were the first to pay the poll-tax to the Messenger of God (peace and blessings be upon him), and the verse of the poll-tax was only sent down after the Conquest, namely His words, Exalted: Fight those who do not believe in God nor in the Last Day, and do not forbid what God and His Messenger have forbidden, and do not follow the religion of truth, from among those who were given the Book, until they pay the poll-tax out of hand while they are humbled (9:29).
Abū Bakr ibn Mardawayh said: Sulaymān ibn Aḥmad related to us: Aḥmad ibn Dāwūd al-Makkī related to us: Bishr ibn Mihrān related to us: Muḥammad ibn Dīnār informed us, from Dāwūd ibn Abī Hind, from al-Shaʿbī, from Jābir, who said: Al-ʿĀqib and al-Ṭayyib came to the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him), and he called them to mutual cursing, and they promised him that they would curse with him the next morning. He said: So the Messenger of God (peace and blessings be upon him) went out in the morning and took ʿAlī, Fāṭimah, al-Ḥasan and al-Ḥusayn by the hand, then sent for the two of them, but they refused to come and acknowledged the tribute (kharāj). He said: The Messenger of God (peace and blessings be upon him) said: “By Him who sent me with the truth, had they said no, the valley would have rained fire upon them.” Jābir said: Concerning them was sent down let us call our sons and your sons, our women and your women, ourselves and yourselves (3:61). Jābir said: ourselves and yourselves: the Messenger of God (peace and blessings be upon him) and ʿAlī ibn Abī Ṭālib; our sons: al-Ḥasan and al-Ḥusayn; our women: Fāṭimah.
Thus al-Ḥākim related it in his Mustadrak, from ʿAlī ibn ʿĪsā, from Aḥmad ibn Muḥammad al-Azharī, from ʿAlī ibn Ḥujr, from ʿAlī ibn Mushir, from Dāwūd ibn Abī Hind, with the same chain and meaning. Then he said: sound according to the criterion of Muslim, though the two of them did not include it.
So he said; but Abū Dāwūd al-Ṭayālisī related it from Shuʿbah, from al-Mughīrah, from al-Shaʿbī, as a mursal report4, and this is more sound. The like of this has been related from Ibn ʿAbbās and al-Barāʾ.
Then God, Exalted, said: Surely this is the true narrative (3:62), that is: this which We have related to you, O Muḥammad, concerning the affair of Jesus is the truth from which there is no turning aside and no escape; and there is no god but God, and surely God is the Mighty, the Wise. But if they turn away (3:62-63), that is: from this to something else, then surely God knows the corrupters (3:63), that is: whoever turns aside from the truth to falsehood is the corrupter, and God knows him and will requite him for that with the worst of requitals; and He is the Powerful, whom nothing escapes—glory be to Him and praise, and we seek refuge in Him from the descent of His vengeance.
On 3:64
This address encompasses the People of the Book, both the Jews and the Christians, and whoever follows their course: Say: O People of the Book, come to a word (3:64). The term “word” (kalimah) is applied to a complete meaningful sentence, as He has used it here. Then He described it with His words: common between us and you (3:64), that is: just and equitable, in which we and you stand equal. Then He explained it with His words: that we worship none but God, and associate nothing with Him (3:64)—
no idol, no graven image, no cross, no false deity (ṭāghūt), no fire, nor anything else; rather, we devote worship to God alone, who has no partner. This is the call of all the messengers. God, Exalted, said: And We did not send before you any messenger but We revealed to him that there is no god but I, so worship Me (21:25). And He, Exalted, said: And We indeed sent forth among every community a messenger, saying: Worship God and shun the false deity (16:36).
Then He said: and that none of us take others as lords besides God (3:64). Ibn Jurayj said: meaning, that none of us obey another in disobedience to God. ʿIkrimah said: meaning, that none of us prostrate to another.
But if they turn away, then say: Bear witness that we are Muslims (3:64), that is: if they turn away from this equitable offer and this call, then you call them to witness that you continue upon the Islam which God has laid down for you.
We have mentioned in the commentary on al-Bukhārī, at his narration by way of al-Zuhrī, from ʿUbayd Allāh ibn ʿAbd Allāh ibn ʿUtbah ibn Masʿūd, from Ibn ʿAbbās, from Abū Sufyān, in his story when he went in before Caesar, who asked them about the lineage of the Messenger of God (peace and blessings be upon him), his description, his qualities and what he called to, and he informed him of all of that plainly—even though Abū Sufyān was at that time a polytheist who had not yet become a Muslim, and that was after the truce of al-Ḥudaybiyah and before the Conquest, as is stated explicitly in the ḥadīth, and because when he asked: Does he act treacherously? he said: I said: No, and we are in a period of truce with him in which we do not know what he will do. He said: And no word was possible for me in which I could add anything beyond this. The point is that he said: Then the letter of the Messenger of God (peace and blessings be upon him) was brought and he read it, and in it was:
“In the name of God, the Compassionate, the Merciful. From Muḥammad, the Messenger of God, to Heraclius, the great one of the Romans. Peace be upon whoever follows the guidance. To proceed: Submit and you will be safe; submit, and God will give you your reward twice over; but if you turn away, then upon you is the sin of the peasants (arīsiyyīn)5. And: O People of the Book, come to a word common between us and you: that we worship none but God, and associate nothing with Him, and that none of us take others as lords besides God. But if they turn away, then say: Bear witness that we are Muslims (3:64).”
Muḥammad ibn Isḥāq and more than one other have mentioned that the opening part of Sūrat Āl ʿImrān, up to eighty-odd verses of it, was sent down concerning the delegation of Najrān; and al-Zuhrī said: they were the first to offer the poll-tax (jizyah); and there is no disagreement that the verse of the poll-tax was sent down after the Conquest. So how is one to reconcile the writing of this verse, before the Conquest, to Heraclius as part of the letter, with what Muḥammad ibn Isḥāq and al-Zuhrī have mentioned? The answer is from several aspects:
- The first: it is possible that this verse was sent down twice, once before al-Ḥudaybiyah and once after the Conquest.
- The second: it is possible that the opening part of Sūrat Āl ʿImrān was sent down concerning the delegation of Najrān up to the point of this verse, and that this verse had been sent down before that, so that the statement of Ibn Isḥāq, “up to eighty-odd verses”, is not accurately preserved, by the indication of the ḥadīth of Abū Sufyān.
- The third: it is possible that the arrival of the delegation of Najrān was before al-Ḥudaybiyah, and that what they offered was a settlement in lieu of the mutual imprecation, not by way of the poll-tax; rather, it would be of the nature of a truce and settlement, and the sending down of the verse of the poll-tax afterwards happened to accord with that—just as the imposition of the fifth and the four-fifths came in accordance with what ʿAbd Allāh ibn Jaḥsh had done in that expedition before Badr, after which the obligatory division was sent down in accordance with it.
- The fourth: it is possible that when the Messenger of God (peace and blessings be upon him) was commanded to write these words in his letter to Heraclius, it had not yet been sent down, and then the Qur’an came down in agreement with it, just as it came down in agreement with ʿUmar ibn al-Khaṭṭāb (may God be pleased with him) regarding the veil, regarding the captives, regarding not praying over the hypocrites, regarding His words And take the Station of Abraham as a place of prayer (2:125), and regarding His words It may be that his Lord, if he divorces you, will give him in exchange wives better than you, to the end of the verse (66:5).
About this text
This is a complete English rendering of Tafsīr al-Qurʾān al-ʿAẓīm on these verses, prepared for this website from the public-domain Arabic text (tafsir.app, src=ibn-katheer). Nothing is abridged: every opinion, every report with its chain of transmission, every verse of poetry and every grammatical note is translated. Qur’anic quotations are in bold; the translator’s own notes are confined to the numbered footnotes and identify names, terms and variant readings only. A second translator has not checked the rendering, and the Arabic is linked so that any passage can be compared. The modern editors’ apparatus is not part of the classical text and is not translated.
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Notes
- That is, a member of the tribe of Bakr ibn Wāʾil. ↩
- That is, Sūrat al-Naml (27), which opens with the letters Ṭā Sīn and relates Solomon’s letter beginning “In the name of God, the Compassionate, the Merciful” (27:30); hence the Prophet’s letter here opens with a different formula. ↩
- That is, to defy him to his face. ↩
- A report whose chain omits the Companion, so that the Successor al-Shaʿbī relates it directly without naming Jābir. ↩
- The subjects and tillers of the soil under Byzantine rule; the sense is that Heraclius would bear the guilt of those who followed him in rejecting the call. ↩