Tafsīr al-Jalālayn, by Jalāl al-Dīn al-Maḥallī and Jalāl al-Dīn al-Suyūṭī (d. 864 AH / 1459 CE and 911 AH / 1505 CE). The two Jalāls’ gloss, a sentence or two to a verse, which became the handbook commentary of the Muslim world.
The complete commentary on Neither killed nor crucified (4:155-159), covering 4:155 to 4:159.
On 4:155
So for their breaking (4:155) – mā is redundant, and the bāʾ is causal, attached to an elided verb, that is, “We cursed them because of their breaking” – their covenant, and their disbelief in the signs of God, and their killing the prophets without right, and their saying to the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him): Our hearts are wrapped, they do not take in your speech. Nay, God has sealed, stamped, them because of their disbelief, so they take in no admonition; so they do not believe, except a few of them, such as ʿAbd Allāh ibn Salām and his companions.
On 4:156
And for their disbelief (4:156), a second time, in Jesus – the bāʾ is repeated to separate it from what is conjoined to it – and their uttering against Mary a tremendous calumny, in that they accused her of fornication.
On 4:157
And their saying (4:157), boastfully, We killed the Messiah, Jesus son of Mary, the messenger of God – according to their claim; that is, on account of the sum of all this We punished them. He, Exalted, said, giving them the lie: And they did not kill him, nor did they crucify him, but it was made to appear so to them: the one killed and crucified – who was one of their own – was made to resemble Jesus, that is, God cast upon him his likeness, so that they thought it was he. And truly those who differ concerning him, that is, concerning Jesus, are in doubt about it, about his killing, for some of them said, when they saw the one who had been killed: The face is the face of Jesus, but the body is not his body, so it is not he; while others said: No, it is he. They have no knowledge of it, of his killing, except the following of conjecture – a disjunctive exception (istithnāʾ munqaṭiʿ), that is, “but they follow in this the conjecture that they imagined” – and they did not kill him for certain: a circumstantial qualifier (ḥāl) confirming the negation of the killing.
On 4:158
Nay, God raised him up to Himself; and God is Mighty (4:158) in His dominion, Wise in His handiwork.
On 4:159
And there is not (4:159) – in meaning “not” – of the People of the Book anyone but will surely believe in him, in Jesus, before his death, that is, the death of the person of the Book, when he sees the angels of death, so that his belief does not benefit him; or before the death of Jesus, when he descends near the Hour, as has come in a ḥadīth. And on the Day of Resurrection he, Jesus, shall be a witness against them regarding what they did when he was sent to them.
About this text
This is a complete English rendering of Tafsīr al-Jalālayn on these verses, prepared for this website from the public-domain Arabic text (tafsir.app, src=jalalayn). 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.
Neither killed nor crucified (4:155-159): all commentaries · The classical commentaries