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.
The complete commentary on The birth of Jesus (19:16-37), covering 19:16-21 to 19:34-37.
On 19:16-21
When the Exalted had related the story of Zachariah (peace be upon him), and how He brought forth from him, in his old age and with his wife barren, a child pure, clean and blessed, He followed it by relating the story of Mary and His bringing forth from her her son Jesus (peace be upon them both) without a father; for between the two stories there is a correspondence and a resemblance. For this reason He mentioned them together in Āl ʿImrān, here, and in Sūrat al-Anbiyāʾ, joining the two stories because of the closeness in meaning between them, so as to show His servants His power and the greatness of His authority, and that He has power over whatever He wills. So He said: And mention in the Book Mary (19:16). She is Mary daughter of ʿImrān, of the line of David (peace be upon him), and she was of a pure and goodly house among the Children of Israel. God, Exalted, has related the story of her mother giving birth to her in Āl ʿImrān: that she vowed her as one consecrated (muḥarrarah), that is, to serve the sanctuary of Jerusalem (Bayt al-Maqdis), for they used to draw near to God by that; so her Lord accepted her with a goodly acceptance and made her grow with a goodly growth (3:37). She grew up among the Children of Israel in a magnificent manner, and became one of the devout worshipping women renowned for great worship, devotion and unflagging effort. She was in the guardianship of her sister’s husband (and it was said: her maternal aunt’s husband) Zachariah, the prophet of the Children of Israel at that time and their great one, to whom they referred in matters of their religion. Zachariah saw in her such astonishing marks of divine favour (karāmāt) as dazzled him: Whenever Zachariah entered upon her in the sanctuary he found provision with her. He said: O Mary, whence have you this? She said: It is from God; indeed God provides for whom He wills without reckoning (3:37). It is related that he would find with her the fruit of winter in summer and the fruit of summer in winter, as was explained earlier in Āl ʿImrān. So when God, Exalted, and His is the wisdom and the conclusive argument, willed to bring forth from her His servant and messenger Jesus (peace be upon him), one of the five great messengers of firm resolve (ulū al-ʿazm), she withdrew from her people to an eastern place (19:16), that is, she went apart from them and drew aside from them, and went to the east of the sacred sanctuary.
Al-Suddī said: because of a menstruation that came upon her. And it was said: for some other reason. Abū Kudaynah said, from Qābūs ibn Abī Ẓibyān, from his father, from Ibn ʿAbbās, who said: Prayer towards the House and pilgrimage to it were prescribed for the People of the Book, and nothing turned them away from it except the saying of your Lord: she withdrew from her people to an eastern place (19:16). He said: Mary went out to an eastern place, so they prayed towards the rising-place of the sun. Ibn Abī Ḥātim and Ibn Jarīr related it.
Ibn Jarīr also said: Isḥāq ibn Shāhīn related to us: Khālid ibn ʿAbd Allāh related to us, from Dāwūd, from ʿĀmir, from Ibn ʿAbbās, who said: I am indeed the most knowledgeable of God’s creatures as to why the Christians took the east as their direction of prayer (qiblah): it is because of the words of God, Exalted, she withdrew from her people to an eastern place (19:16); and they took the birthplace of Jesus as a qiblah.
Qatādah said: an eastern place (19:16): remote and set apart.
Muḥammad ibn Isḥāq said: She went with her pitcher to draw water.
Nawf al-Bikālī said: She took for herself a dwelling in which to devote herself to worship. And God knows best.
His words: and she took a veil apart from them (19:17), that is, she screened herself from them and hid herself. Then God, Exalted, sent to her Gabriel (peace be upon him), and he appeared to her in the likeness of a well-formed man (19:17), that is, in the form of a complete and perfect human being.
Mujāhid, al-Ḍaḥḥāk, Qatādah, Ibn Jurayj, Wahb ibn Munabbih and al-Suddī said regarding His words So We sent to her Our Spirit (19:17): meaning Gabriel (peace be upon him).
What they said is the apparent sense of the Qurʾān, for the Exalted has said in the other verse: The Trustworthy Spirit brought it down upon your heart, that you might be one of the warners (26:193-194).
Abū Jaʿfar al-Rāzī said, from al-Rabīʿ ibn Anas, from Abū al-ʿĀliyah, from Ubayy ibn Kaʿb, who said: The spirit of Jesus (peace be upon him) was among the spirits from which the covenant was taken in the time of Adam, and it was he who appeared to her in the likeness of a well-formed man (that is, the spirit of Jesus) and she conceived the one who addressed her, and he entered into her mouth.
This is extremely strange and objectionable, and it seems to be an Israelite tradition (Isrāʾīliyyāt).
She said: I seek refuge in the All-Merciful from you, if you are God-fearing (19:18), that is, when the angel appeared to her in the form of a man, while she was in a secluded place with a veil between her and her people, she was afraid of him and thought that he wanted her for himself, so she said: I seek refuge in the All-Merciful from you, if you are God-fearing (19:18), that is, if you fear God. This was a reminder to him of God, and this is what is prescribed in repelling an assailant: that it be by the gentlest means, then the next gentlest. So she first sought to make him fear God, Mighty and Majestic.
Ibn Jarīr said: Abū Kurayb related to me: Abū Bakr related to us, from ʿĀṣim, who said: Abū Wāʾil said, and he mentioned the story of Mary, and said: She knew that the God-fearing man is one possessed of restraint, when she said: I seek refuge in the All-Merciful from you, if you are God-fearing. He said: I am only a messenger of your Lord (19:18-19), that is, the angel said to her, answering her and removing the fear for herself that had arisen in her: I am not what you think; rather I am a messenger of your Lord, that is, He has sent me to you. And it is said that when she mentioned the All-Merciful, Gabriel trembled with fear and returned to his own form, and said: “I am only a messenger of your Lord, that He may grant you (li-yahaba laki) a pure boy.”
Thus did Abū ʿAmr ibn al-ʿAlāʾ, one of the famous reciters, read it. The others read: that I may grant you (li-ahaba laki) a pure boy (19:19).1 Both readings have a sound basis and a correct meaning, and each entails the other.
She said: How can I have a boy, when no man has touched me, and I have not been unchaste? (19:20), that is, Mary marvelled at this and said: How can I have a boy? That is, in what manner could this boy come to be from me, when I have no husband, and no indecency can be imagined of me? Hence she said: when no man has touched me, and I have not been unchaste (19:20). The baghiyy is the fornicatress; hence it comes in the ḥadīth that the hire of the prostitute (mahr al-baghiyy) was forbidden.
He said: So it will be. Your Lord has said: It is easy for Me (19:21), that is, the angel said to her, answering what she had asked: God has said that a boy will indeed come to be from you, even though you have no husband and no indecency has come from you, for He has power over whatever He wills. Hence He said: and that We may make him a sign for mankind (19:21), that is, a proof and a token for mankind of the power of their Maker and Creator, who has diversified their creation: He created their father Adam from neither male nor female; He created Eve from a male without a female; He created the rest of the progeny from male and female, except Jesus, for He brought him into being from a female without a male. Thus the fourfold division was completed, pointing to the perfection of His power and the greatness of His authority; so there is no god other than He and no Lord besides Him.
His words: and a mercy from Us (19:21), that is, and We shall make this boy a mercy from God, a prophet among the prophets, calling to the worship of God, Exalted, and His oneness, as the Exalted said in the other verse: When the angels said: O Mary, indeed God gives you glad tidings of a Word from Him, whose name is the Messiah, Jesus son of Mary, eminent in this world and the Hereafter and among those brought near. And he will speak to people in the cradle and in maturity, and he will be among the righteous (3:45-46), that is, he will call to the worship of God his Lord in his cradle and in his maturity.
Ibn Abī Ḥātim said: my father related to us: ʿAbd al-Raḥīm ibn Ibrāhīm, Duḥaym, related to us: Marwān related to us: al-ʿAlāʾ ibn al-Ḥārith al-Kūfī related to us, from Mujāhid, who said: Mary (peace be upon her) said: When I was alone, Jesus would talk to me and speak with me while he was in my womb, and when I was among people he would glorify God and magnify Him in my womb.
His words: and it was a matter decreed (19:21). It may be that this is part of Gabriel’s speech to Mary, informing her that this is a matter foreordained in the knowledge of God, Exalted, His decree and His will. And it may be that it is part of God’s report, Exalted, to His Messenger Muḥammad (peace and blessings be upon him), and that He alluded by this to the breathing into her private part, as the Exalted said: And Mary daughter of ʿImrān, who guarded her chastity, so We breathed into it of Our Spirit (66:12), and He said: And she who guarded her chastity, so We breathed into her of Our Spirit (21:91).
Muḥammad ibn Isḥāq said: and it was a matter decreed (19:21), that is, God had resolved upon this, and there was no escaping it. Ibn Jarīr also preferred this in his commentary, and related no other view. And God knows best.
On 19:22-23
The Exalted says, informing about Mary, that when Gabriel had said to her from God, Exalted, what he said, she submitted to the decree of God, Exalted. More than one of the scholars of the early generations (salaf) mentioned that at that point the angel, that is, Gabriel (peace be upon him), breathed into the opening of her garment, and the breath descended until it entered the private part, and she conceived the child by the leave of God, Exalted. When she had conceived him she was sorely distressed by it and did not know what she would say to people, for she knew that people would not believe her in what she told them; however, she disclosed her secret and mentioned her situation to her sister, the wife of Zachariah. That was because Zachariah (peace be upon him) had asked God for a child and had been granted that, and his wife had conceived. Mary went in to her, and she rose to her and embraced her, and said: Have you perceived, O Mary, that I am pregnant? Mary said to her: And have you also come to know that I am pregnant? And she told her of her situation and what had befallen her, and they were a household of faith and belief. Thereafter, whenever the wife of Zachariah came face to face with Mary, she would feel the one in her womb prostrating to the one in Mary’s belly, that is, honouring him and humbling himself before him; for prostration at greeting was lawful in their religious community (millah), just as Joseph’s parents and brothers prostrated to him, and just as God commanded the angels to prostrate to Adam (peace be upon him). But it was forbidden in this religious community of ours, to perfect the veneration of the majesty of the Lord, Exalted.
Ibn Abī Ḥātim said: ʿAlī ibn al-Ḥusayn related to us, saying: It was read out to al-Ḥārith ibn Miskīn while I was listening; he said: ʿAbd al-Raḥmān ibn al-Qāsim informed us, saying: Mālik (may God have mercy on him) said: It has reached me that Jesus son of Mary and John son of Zachariah were the sons of two sisters, and that they were both carried in the womb at the same time; and it has reached me that the mother of John said to Mary: I feel that what is in my belly is prostrating to what is in your belly. Mālik said: I consider that to be on account of the superiority of Jesus (peace be upon him), because God made him bring the dead to life and heal the one born blind and the leper.
Then the commentators differed regarding the duration of the pregnancy with Jesus (peace be upon him). What is well known from the majority is that she carried him for nine months. ʿIkrimah said: eight months, and he said: that is why no child born at eight months survives.
Ibn Jurayj said: al-Mughīrah ibn ʿUthmān ibn ʿAbd Allāh al-Thaqafī informed me that he heard Ibn ʿAbbās, when he was asked about the pregnancy of Mary, say: It was no more than that she conceived and gave birth.
This is strange, and it seems that he took it from the apparent sense of the words of the Exalted: So she conceived him and withdrew with him to a remote place. Then the pains of childbirth drove her to the trunk of the palm tree (19:22-23). But the fāʾ (the connective “then”), although it denotes immediate succession, denotes in each case the succession proper to that thing, as the Exalted said: And We certainly created man from an extract of clay. Then We made him a drop in a firm lodging. Then We made the drop into a clinging clot, and We made the clot into a lump, and We made the lump into bones (23:12-14): this fāʾ denotes the succession proper to it, and it is established in the two Ṣaḥīḥs that between each two of these stages there are forty days. And the Exalted said: Have you not seen that God sends down water from the sky, and then the earth becomes green? (22:63). So the well-known and apparent view, and God has power over all things, is that she carried him as women carry their children. Hence, when the signs of pregnancy appeared upon her, there was with her in the sanctuary a righteous man among her relatives who served the Holy House alongside her, called Joseph the Carpenter (Yūsuf al-Najjār). When he saw the heaviness and size of her belly, he found that objectionable in her; but then what he knew of her innocence, her integrity, her religion and her devotion turned him from it. Then he reflected on the condition she was in, and her situation kept going round in his mind, and he could not drive it from himself. So he brought himself to speak to her by way of allusion, and said: O Mary, I am going to ask you about a matter, so do not be hasty with me. She said: And what is it? He said: Can there ever be a tree without seed? And can there be a crop without sowing? And can there be a child without a father? She said: Yes, for she understood what he was alluding to. As for your saying, “Can there be a tree without seed, and a crop without sowing?”: God created the tree and the crop, when He first created them, without seed and without sowing. “And can there be a creature without a father?”: God created Adam without a father or a mother. So he believed her and accepted her condition.
When Mary sensed from her people that they suspected her of impropriety, she withdrew from them to a remote place, that is, a place distant from them and far away from them, so that she would not see them and they would not see her.
Muḥammad ibn Isḥāq said: When she had conceived him, filled her pitcher and returned, her menses ceased, and there befell her what befalls a woman pregnant with child by way of sickness, cravings and change of complexion, to the point that her tongue became cracked. There had never come upon any household what came upon the family of Zachariah. The talk spread among the Children of Israel, and they said: “Her companion is none other than Joseph”, for there was no one with her in the temple (kanīsah) besides him. She hid herself from people and took a veil apart from them, so that no one saw her and she saw no one.
His words: Then the pains of childbirth drove her to the trunk of the palm tree (19:23), that is, the labour pains compelled her and forced her to take refuge at the trunk of the palm tree, which was a palm tree in the place to which she had withdrawn.
They differed concerning it. Al-Suddī said: It was to the east of her prayer-niche (miḥrāb) in which she used to pray, in Jerusalem (Bayt al-Maqdis).
Wahb ibn Munabbih said: She went off in flight, and when she was between Syria (al-Shām) and the land of Egypt, the labour pains struck her. And in another report from Wahb: That was eight miles from Jerusalem, in a village there called Bethlehem (Bayt Laḥm).
I say: It has already been mentioned in the ḥadīth of the Night Journey (al-Isrāʾ), in the narration of al-Nasāʾī from Anas (may God be pleased with him) and of al-Bayhaqī from Shaddād ibn Aws (may God be pleased with him), that this was in Bethlehem. And God knows best. This is the well-known account that people have received one from another, and the Christians do not doubt that it was in Bethlehem; people have received it, and the ḥadīth has come concerning it, if it is sound.
His words, Exalted, informing about her: She said: Would that I had died before this and been a thing forgotten, out of mind! (19:23). In this is proof that it is permissible to wish for death at a time of trial (fitnah), for she knew that she would be tried and tested by this newborn, regarding whom people would not take her case in a sound light nor believe her account; and after having been in their eyes a devout worshipper, she would become in their eyes, as they supposed, a harlot and fornicatress. So she said: Would that I had died before this (19:23), that is, before this state of affairs, and been a thing forgotten, out of mind (19:23), that is, had never been created and had never been anything. Ibn ʿAbbās said this.
Al-Suddī said: She said, while in the throes of labour from the pregnancy, out of shame before people: Would that I had died before this distress I am in, and this grief at my giving birth to a child without a husband; and been a thing forgotten, out of mind (19:23): forgotten, so that the search for it was abandoned, like menstrual rags which, when thrown away and discarded, are neither sought nor remembered. Likewise everything that is forgotten and abandoned is nasiyy.
Qatādah said: and been a thing forgotten, out of mind (19:23), that is, something unknown and unmentioned, so that no one would know who I am.
Al-Rabīʿ ibn Anas said: and been a thing forgotten, out of mind (19:23): it is the miscarried foetus.
Ibn Zayd said: Had never been anything at all.
We have already presented the ḥadīths indicating the prohibition of wishing for death except at a time of trial, in connection with His words: Cause me to die as a Muslim and join me with the righteous (12:101).
On 19:24-26
Some read man taḥtahā (“the one who was beneath her”), in the sense of “he who was below her”; others read min taḥtihā (“from beneath her”), taking it as a preposition.2
The commentators differed as to who is intended by that. Al-ʿAwfī and others said, from Ibn ʿAbbās: Then he called to her from beneath her (19:24): Gabriel; and Jesus did not speak until she brought him to her people. Likewise Saʿīd ibn Jubayr, al-Ḍaḥḥāk, ʿAmr ibn Maymūn, al-Suddī and Qatādah said: It was the angel Gabriel (blessings and peace be upon him), that is, he called to her from the lower part of the valley.
Mujāhid said: Then he called to her from beneath her (19:24): he said: Jesus son of Mary. Likewise ʿAbd al-Razzāq said, from Maʿmar, from Qatādah, who said: al-Ḥasan said: It was her son. This is one of the two reports from Saʿīd ibn Jubayr: that it was her son; he said: Have you not heard God say: So she pointed to him (19:29)? Ibn Zayd preferred this, as did Ibn Jarīr in his commentary.
His words: Do not grieve (19:24), that is, he called to her saying: Do not grieve. Your Lord has placed beneath you a rivulet (sariyy) (19:24). Sufyān al-Thawrī and Shuʿbah said, from Abū Isḥāq, from al-Barāʾ ibn ʿĀzib: Your Lord has placed beneath you a rivulet (19:24): he said: the brook. Likewise ʿAlī ibn Abī Ṭalḥah said, from Ibn ʿAbbās: the sariyy is the river. ʿAmr ibn Maymūn held the same: a river from which she could drink.
Mujāhid said: It is “river” in Syriac.
Saʿīd ibn Jubayr said: The sariyy is “the small river” in Nabataean.
Al-Ḍaḥḥāk said: It is “the small river” in Syriac.
Ibrāhīm al-Nakhaʿī said: It is the small river.
Qatādah said: It is the brook, in the dialect of the people of the Ḥijāz.
Wahb ibn Munabbih said: The sariyy is a running stream of water.
Al-Suddī said: It is the river. Ibn Jarīr preferred this view. A ḥadīth traced back to the Prophet (marfūʿ) has come concerning this. Al-Ṭabarānī said:
Abū Shuʿayb al-Ḥarrānī related to us: Yaḥyā ibn ʿAbd Allāh al-Bābluttī related to us: Ayyūb ibn Nahīk related to us: I heard ʿIkrimah, the client (mawlā) of Ibn ʿAbbās, say: I heard Ibn ʿUmar say: I heard the Messenger of God (peace and blessings be upon him) say: “The sariyy of which God said to Mary, Your Lord has placed beneath you a rivulet (19:24), is a river that God brought forth for her to drink from.” This is a very strange (gharīb) ḥadīth by this route. This Ayyūb ibn Nahīk is al-Ḥubulī; Abū Ḥātim al-Rāzī said of him: weak. Abū Zurʿah said: objectionable in ḥadīth (munkar al-ḥadīth). Abū al-Fatḥ al-Azdī said: abandoned in ḥadīth (matrūk al-ḥadīth).
Others said: What is meant by the sariyy is Jesus (peace be upon him). This was held by al-Ḥasan, al-Rabīʿ ibn Anas and Muḥammad ibn ʿAbbād ibn Jaʿfar; it is one of the two reports from Qatādah, and the view of ʿAbd al-Raḥmān ibn Zayd ibn Aslam. The first view is more apparent, and for this reason He said after it: And shake towards you the trunk of the palm tree (19:25), that is, take hold of the trunk of the palm tree and draw it towards you. It was said: it was dry; Ibn ʿAbbās said this. And it was said: fruit-bearing. Mujāhid said: it was an ʿajwah palm.3 Al-Thawrī said, from Abū Dāwūd Nufayʿ al-Aʿmā: it was a ṣarafānah palm.4
What is apparent is that it was a tree, but it was not in the season of its fruit; Wahb ibn Munabbih said this. For this reason He bestowed this favour upon her, in that He placed food and drink with her, and said: it will drop upon you fresh ripe dates. So eat and drink and be comforted (19:25-26), that is, be of good cheer. Hence ʿAmr ibn Maymūn said: There is nothing better for a woman in childbed than dried dates and fresh ripe dates; then he recited this noble verse.
Ibn Abī Ḥātim said: ʿAlī ibn al-Ḥusayn related to us: Shaybān related to us: Masrūr ibn Saʿīd al-Tamīmī related to us: ʿAbd al-Raḥmān ibn ʿAmr al-Awzāʿī related to us, from ʿUrwah ibn Ruwaym, from ʿAlī ibn Abī Ṭālib, who said: The Messenger of God (peace and blessings be upon him) said: “Honour your paternal aunt the palm tree, for it was created from the clay from which Adam (peace be upon him) was created, and there is no tree that is pollinated except it.” And the Messenger of God (peace and blessings be upon him) said: “Feed your women who have given birth fresh ripe dates, and if there are no fresh ripe dates then dried dates; and among trees there is no tree more honoured with God than the tree beneath which Mary daughter of ʿImrān alighted.”
This is a very objectionable (munkar) ḥadīth. Abū Yaʿlā related it from Shaybān with the same chain.
Some read His words “tassāqaṭ” with doubling of the sīn, and others with it light (“tasāqaṭ“). Abū Nahīk read: tusāqiṭ upon you fresh ripe dates (19:25). Abū Isḥāq related from al-Barāʾ that he read it “tusāqiṭ“, that is, with the trunk as its subject.5 All of them are close in meaning.
His words: And if you see any human being (19:26), that is, whomever you may see of anyone, say: I have vowed a fast to the All-Merciful, so I shall not speak today to any human (19:26). What is meant by this “saying” is indicating it to him by gesture, not that what is meant is verbal speech, lest it contradict so I shall not speak today to any human (19:26).
Anas ibn Mālik said regarding His words I have vowed a fast to the All-Merciful (19:26): that is, silence. Likewise Ibn ʿAbbās and al-Ḍaḥḥāk said. And in another report from Anas: “a fast and silence”; and likewise Qatādah and others besides them said.
What is meant is that when they fasted according to their law, food and speech were forbidden to them. Al-Suddī, Qatādah and ʿAbd al-Raḥmān ibn Zayd stated this explicitly.
Abū Isḥāq said, from Ḥārithah, who said: I was with Ibn Masʿūd when two men came; one of them gave the greeting of peace and the other did not. He said: What is the matter with you? His companions said: He has sworn not to speak to people today. ʿAbd Allāh ibn Masʿūd said: Speak to people and greet them with peace, for that was only a woman who knew that no one would believe her that she had conceived without a husband, meaning by that Mary (peace be upon her), so that it might be an excuse for her when she was questioned. Ibn Abī Ḥātim and Ibn Jarīr (may God have mercy on them both) related it.
ʿAbd al-Raḥmān ibn Zayd said: When Jesus said to Mary, Do not grieve (19:24), she said: And how should I not grieve, when you are with me, and I am neither a married woman nor a slave-girl? What excuse have I before people? Would that I had died before this and been a thing forgotten, out of mind! Jesus said to her: I will spare you the speaking: And if you see any human being, say: I have vowed a fast to the All-Merciful, so I shall not speak today to any human (19:26). He said: All of this is the speech of Jesus to his mother. And Wahb said likewise.
On 19:27-33
The Exalted says, informing about Mary, when she was commanded to fast that day of hers and not to speak to any human being, for her affair would be taken care of and her proof established: she submitted to the command of God, Mighty and Majestic, and resigned herself to His decree, and took her child, and she brought him to her people, carrying him (19:27). When they saw her thus, they considered her deed enormous and found it exceedingly objectionable, and said: O Mary, you have indeed brought a monstrous thing (fariyy) (19:27), that is, an enormous matter. Mujāhid, Qatādah, al-Suddī and more than one other said this.
Ibn Abī Ḥātim said: my father related to us: ʿAbd Allāh ibn Abī Ziyād related to us: Sayyār related to us: Jaʿfar ibn Sulaymān related to us: Abū ʿImrān al-Jawnī related to us, from Nawf al-Bikālī, who said: Her people went out in search of her, and she was of a house of prophethood and nobility, but they found no trace of her. They came upon a cowherd and said: Have you seen a young woman of such-and-such a description? He said: No, but last night I saw from my cattle something I had never seen from them before. They said: And what did you see? He said: I saw them prostrating towards this valley. ʿAbd Allāh ibn Abī Ziyād said: And I recall from Sayyār that he said: I saw a radiant light. So they set out in the direction he had told them, and Mary came to meet them; when she saw them she sat down and took her son in her lap, and they came and stood over her. They said: O Mary, you have indeed brought a monstrous thing (19:27), an enormous matter. O sister of Aaron (19:28), that is, O you who resemble Aaron in worship; your father was not a man of evil, nor was your mother unchaste (19:28), that is, you are of a goodly, pure house, known for righteousness, worship and asceticism; so how did this come forth from you?
ʿAlī ibn Abī Ṭalḥah and al-Suddī said: It was said to her, O sister of Aaron (19:28), that is, the brother of Moses, for she was of his line, just as one says to a man of Tamīm, “O brother of Tamīm”, and to a man of Muḍar, “O brother of Muḍar”.
And it was said: she was ascribed to a righteous man among them whose name was Aaron, for she was compared to him in worship and asceticism.
Ibn Jarīr related from some of them that they likened her to a profligate man among them called Aaron. Ibn Abī Ḥātim related it from Saʿīd ibn Jubayr.
Stranger than all of this is what Ibn Abī Ḥātim related:
ʿAlī ibn al-Ḥusayn al-Hisinjānī related to us: Ibn Abī Maryam related to us: al-Mufaḍḍal ibn Faḍālah related to us: Abū Ṣakhr related to us, from al-Quraẓī, regarding the words of God, Mighty and Majestic, O sister of Aaron (19:28); he said: She was the sister of Aaron by his father and mother, and she was the sister of Moses, the brother of Aaron, who followed the track of Moses, and she watched him from a distance while they did not perceive (28:11).
This view is sheer error, for God, Exalted, has mentioned in His Book that He sent Jesus following in the footsteps of the messengers, which indicates that he was the last of the prophets to be sent, and there is none after him except Muḥammad (God’s blessings and peace be upon him). Hence it is established in the Ṣaḥīḥ of al-Bukhārī, from Abū Hurayrah (may God be pleased with him), from the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him), that he said: “I am the closest of people to the son of Mary, for there is no prophet between me and him.” Were the matter as Muḥammad ibn Kaʿb al-Quraẓī claimed, Jesus would not have been the last of the messengers save Muḥammad; rather he would have been before Solomon and David, for God has mentioned that David was after Moses (peace be upon them both), in the words of the Exalted: Have you not considered the assembly of the Children of Israel after Moses, when they said to a prophet of theirs: Send us a king and we will fight in the way of God. He said: Would you perhaps refrain from fighting if fighting were prescribed for you? They said: And why should we not fight in the way of God? (2:246), and He related the story until He said: And David killed Goliath (2:251), to the end of the verse. What emboldened al-Quraẓī to this statement is what is in the Torah after the exodus of Moses and the Children of Israel from the sea and the drowning of Pharaoh and his people, where it says: And Mary daughter of ʿImrān, the sister of the two prophets Moses and Aaron, took up the tambourine, she and the women with her, glorifying God and thanking Him for what He had bestowed upon the Children of Israel.6 So al-Quraẓī believed that this was the mother of Jesus. This is a slip and a grievous error; rather, she bore the same name as this one, for they used to name after their prophets and righteous ones, as Imām Aḥmad said:
ʿAbd Allāh ibn Idrīs related to us: I heard my father mention it from Simāk, from ʿAlqamah ibn Wāʾil, from al-Mughīrah ibn Shuʿbah, who said: The Messenger of God (peace and blessings be upon him) sent me to Najrān, and they said: What do you make of what you recite, O sister of Aaron (19:28), when Moses was before Jesus by such-and-such a span? He said: So I returned and mentioned that to the Messenger of God (peace and blessings be upon him), and he said: “Why did you not tell them that they used to take names after the prophets and righteous ones who were before them?”
Muslim alone of the two Ṣaḥīḥs transmitted it, as did al-Tirmidhī and al-Nasāʾī, from the ḥadīth of ʿAbd Allāh ibn Idrīs, from his father, from Simāk, with the same chain. Al-Tirmidhī said: ḥasan ṣaḥīḥ gharīb; we do not know it except from the ḥadīth of Ibn Idrīs.
Ibn Jarīr said: Yaʿqūb related to me: Ibn ʿUlayyah related to us, from Saʿīd ibn Abī Ṣadaqah, from Muḥammad ibn Sīrīn, who said: I was informed that Kaʿb said: His words O sister of Aaron (19:28) do not refer to Aaron the brother of Moses. He said: ʿĀʾishah said to him: You have lied. He said: O Mother of the Believers, if the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) said it, then he knows best and is best informed; otherwise, I find between the two of them six hundred years. He said: So she fell silent. There is some doubt about this chronology.
Ibn Jarīr also said: Bishr related to us: Yazīd related to us: Saʿīd related to us, from Qatādah, regarding His words O sister of Aaron, your father was not a man of evil, nor was your mother unchaste (19:28); he said: She was of a house known for righteousness and not known for corruption. Among people there are those who are known for righteousness and beget offspring in it, and others who are known for corruption and beget offspring in it. Aaron was a righteous man, beloved among his clan; he is not Aaron the brother of Moses, but another Aaron. He said: And it was mentioned to us that on the day he died forty thousand of the Children of Israel, all of them named Aaron, followed his funeral procession.
His words: So she pointed to him. They said: How can we speak to one who is in the cradle, a child? (19:29), that is, when they had become suspicious of her situation and found her case objectionable, and said to her what they said, insinuating accusation against her and charging her with the slander, and she was fasting and silent that day, she referred the speech to him, and indicated to them that they should address him and speak to him. So they said, mocking her, and thinking that she was holding them in contempt and making sport of them: How can we speak to one who is in the cradle, a child? (19:29)
Maymūn ibn Mihrān said: So she pointed to him (19:29): she said: Speak to him. They said: On top of the calamity she has brought upon us, she commands us to speak to one who is in the cradle, a child!
Al-Suddī said: When she pointed to him they became angry and said: Her mockery of us, in commanding us to speak to this child, is harder on us than her fornication.
They said: How can we speak to one who is in the cradle, a child? (19:29), that is, one who is present in his cradle in the state of his childhood and infancy, how can he speak? He said: I am the servant of God (19:30). The first thing he spoke was to declare the transcendence of his Lord, Exalted, and to exonerate God from having a child, and to affirm for himself servanthood to his Lord.
His words: He has given me the Book and made me a prophet (19:30): an exoneration of his mother from the indecency that had been attributed to her.
Nawf al-Bikālī said: When they said to his mother what they said, he was suckling at her breast, so he withdrew the breast from his mouth, leaned on his left side, and said: I am the servant of God. He has given me the Book and made me a prophet (19:30), down to His words as long as I live (19:31).
Ḥammād ibn Salamah said, from Thābit al-Bunānī: He raised his forefinger above his shoulder as he said: I am the servant of God. He has given me the Book and made me a prophet (19:30), to the end of the verse.
ʿIkrimah said: He has given me the Book (19:30), that is, He decreed that He would give me the Book, in what He decreed.
Ibn Abī Ḥātim said: my father related to us: Muḥammad ibn al-Muṣaffā related to us: Yaḥyā ibn Saʿīd related to us, from ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz ibn Ziyād, from Anas ibn Mālik (may God be pleased with him), who said: Jesus son of Mary had studied the Gospel and mastered it in his mother’s womb; and that is His saying: I am the servant of God. He has given me the Book and made me a prophet (19:30).
Yaḥyā ibn Saʿīd al-ʿAṭṭār al-Ḥimṣī is abandoned (matrūk).
His words: And He has made me blessed wherever I may be (19:31). Mujāhid, ʿAmr ibn Qays and al-Thawrī said: And He has made me a teacher of good. And in another report from Mujāhid: greatly beneficial.
Ibn Jarīr said: Sulaymān ibn ʿAbd al-Jabbār related to me: Muḥammad ibn Yazīd ibn Khunays al-Makhzūmī related to us: I heard Wuhayb ibn al-Ward, the client of Banū Makhzūm, say: A learned man met a learned man who was above him in knowledge, and said to him: May God have mercy on you; what of my works should I make public? He said: Commanding what is right and forbidding what is wrong, for it is the religion of God with which He sent His prophets to His servants. The jurists are agreed upon the words of God, And He has made me blessed wherever I may be (19:31); and it was asked: What was his blessing? He said: Commanding what is right and forbidding what is wrong, wherever he was.
His words: and He has enjoined upon me prayer and almsgiving as long as I live (19:31), are like the words of the Exalted to Muḥammad (peace and blessings be upon him): And worship your Lord until the certainty comes to you (15:99).
ʿAbd al-Raḥmān ibn al-Qāsim said, from Mālik ibn Anas, regarding His words and He has enjoined upon me prayer and almsgiving as long as I live (19:31); he said: He informed him of what would be of his affair until he died. How firmly this establishes the case against the partisans of free will (ahl al-qadar)!7
His words: and dutiful to my mother (19:32), that is, and He commanded me to be dutiful to my mother. He mentioned it after obedience to God his Lord, because God, Exalted, very often joins the command to worship Him with obedience to parents, as the Exalted said: And your Lord has decreed that you worship none but Him, and kindness to parents (17:23), and He said: Give thanks to Me and to your parents; to Me is the final return (31:14).
His words: and He has not made me a tyrant, wretched (19:32), that is, He has not made me a tyrant, arrogantly disdaining His worship and obedience and dutifulness to my mother, so that I should become wretched thereby.
Sufyān al-Thawrī said: The wretched tyrant is the one who gives himself over to anger.
One of the early generations said: You will not find anyone undutiful to his parents without finding him a wretched tyrant; then he recited: and dutiful to my mother, and He has not made me a tyrant, wretched (19:32). He said: And you will not find anyone who mistreats those under his authority without finding him conceited and boastful; then he recited: and those whom your right hands possess; indeed God does not love anyone who is conceited and boastful (4:36).
Qatādah said: It was mentioned to us that a woman saw the son of Mary bringing the dead to life and healing the one born blind and the leper, among the signs over which God had given him power and in which He had given him permission, and she said: Blessed is the womb that bore you and the breast at which you were suckled! The prophet of God Jesus (peace be upon him) said in reply to her: Blessed is he who recites the word of God and follows what is in it, and is not a tyrant, wretched.
His words: And peace be upon me the day I was born, the day I die, and the day I am raised up alive (19:33): an affirmation on his part of his servanthood to God, Mighty and Majestic, and that he is a creature among the creatures of God, who lives and dies and is raised up like the rest of created beings; but he has safety in these states, which are the most arduous that servants face. God’s blessings and peace be upon him.
On 19:34-37
He, Exalted, says to His Messenger Muḥammad (peace and blessings be upon him): that which We have related to you of the account of Jesus is the word of truth concerning which they are in doubt (19:34), that is: concerning which the followers of falsehood and the followers of truth differ, those who believe in him and those who disbelieve in him. For this reason the majority read “qawlu al-ḥaqq” with the nominative on “qawl”, while ʿĀṣim and ʿAbd Allāh ibn ʿĀmir read qawla al-ḥaqq (with the accusative).8
It is related of Ibn Masʿūd that he read: “That is Jesus son of Mary; he spoke the truth” (qāla al-ḥaqqa). The nominative is the more evident in point of grammatical analysis (iʿrāb), and His words, Exalted, bear witness to it: The truth is from your Lord, so do not be among the doubters (3:59–60).
And when He, Exalted, had mentioned that He created him a servant and a prophet, He declared His Holy Self free of all blemish and said: It is not for God to take any son; glory be to Him (19:35), that is: far above what these ignorant, wrongdoing, transgressing people say, in great exaltation. When He decrees a matter, He only says to it “Be”, and it is (19:35), that is: when He wills a thing, He merely commands it, and it comes to be as He wishes, as He, Exalted, said: 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 (3:59–60).
And His words: And surely God is my Lord and your Lord, so worship Him; this is a straight path (19:36), that is: among the things that Jesus commanded his people while he was in his cradle was that he informed them at that very time that God was their Lord and his Lord, and he commanded them to worship Him, saying: so worship Him; this is a straight path (19:36),
that is: this which I have brought you from God is a straight path, that is, an upright one: whoever follows it is rightly guided and well directed, and whoever opposes it goes astray and errs.
And His words: Then the factions differed among themselves (19:37), that is: the statements of the People of the Book concerning Jesus diverged after the exposition of his affair and the clarity of his condition, namely that he is His servant and His messenger and His word which He cast to Mary and a spirit from Him. One party (the generality of the Jews, upon them be the curses of God) resolved that he was a child of fornication, and they said: this speech of his is sorcery. Another party said: it was really God who spoke. Others said: he is the son of God. Others said: the third of three. And others said: rather, he is the servant of God and His messenger. This is the word of truth, to which God guided the believers. Something like this has been related from ʿAmr ibn Maymūn, Ibn Jurayj, Qatādah and more than one of the early and the later authorities.
ʿAbd al-Razzāq said: Maʿmar informed us, from Qatādah, concerning His words: That is Jesus son of Mary, the word of truth concerning which they are in doubt (19:34), he said: The Children of Israel assembled and brought forth from among themselves four men, each people bringing forth its learned man, and they disputed about Jesus when he was raised up. One of them said: He is God; He came down to the earth, gave life to whom He gave life and caused to die whom He caused to die, then ascended to heaven, these are the Jacobites. The three said: You have lied. Then two of them said to the third: You speak concerning him. He said: He is the son of God, these are the Nestorians. The two said: You have lied. Then one of the two said to the other: You speak concerning him. He said: He is the third of three: God is a god, he is a god, and his mother is a god, these are the Isrāʾīliyyah9, the kings of the Christians, upon them be the curses of God. The fourth said: You have lied; rather, he is the servant of God and His messenger and His spirit and His word, and these are the Muslims. Each man among them had followers upon what they said, and they fought one another, and the Muslims were overcome. That is the saying of God, Exalted: and they kill those among the people who enjoin justice (3:21). Qatādah said: They are the ones of whom God said: Then the factions differed among themselves (19:37); he said: they differed concerning him and became factions.
Ibn Abī Ḥātim has related, from Ibn ʿAbbās, from ʿUrwah ibn al-Zubayr and from some of the people of knowledge, something close to that. And more than one of the historians, from among the People of the Book and others, has mentioned that Constantine gathered them in a great assembly, one of their three councils famous among them; the company of bishops among them numbered two thousand one hundred and seventy bishops, and they differed concerning Jesus son of Mary (peace be upon him) with widely divergent differences. Every small band said something about him: a hundred would say one thing about him, seventy would say another thing about him, fifty would say something else about him, and a hundred and sixty would say something; and no more than three hundred and eight of them agreed upon a single statement. These agreed upon a position and held firmly to it, and the king inclined towards them, he was a philosopher, so he advanced them, supported them and drove out all who were other than them. They composed for him the Great Trust10(nay, it is rather the great treachery) and they composed for him the books of the canons, legislated things for him, innovated many innovations, and distorted the religion of the Messiah and altered it. He then built for them the great churches throughout the whole of his kingdom: the lands of Syria, the Jazīrah and the Byzantine lands, so that the number of churches in his days reached nearly twelve thousand churches. And his mother Helena built the Qumāmah11 over the place where the crucified one was crucified, the one whom the Jews and the Christians allege was the Messiah, though they lied; rather, God raised him up to heaven.
And His words: So woe to those who disbelieve from the witnessing of a tremendous Day (19:37): this is a threat and a severe warning to whoever lies against God, forges falsehood and alleges that He has a son. But He, Exalted, has granted them respite until the Day of Resurrection and deferred them, out of forbearance and out of confidence in His power over them, for He is the One who does not hasten against whoever disobeys Him, as has come in the two Ṣaḥīḥs: “Surely God grants respite to the wrongdoer, until, when He seizes him, He does not let him escape.” Then the Messenger of God (peace and blessings be upon him) recited: And such is the seizing of your Lord when He seizes the towns while they are wrongdoing; surely His seizing is painful, severe (11:102). In the two Ṣaḥīḥs also it is related from the Messenger of God (peace and blessings be upon him) that he said: “No one is more patient over an injury he hears than God: they attribute a son to Him, while He provides for them and keeps them in health.” And God, Exalted, has said: And how many a town I granted respite while it was wrongdoing; then I seized it, and to Me is the return (22:48). And He, Exalted, said: And do not think that God is heedless of what the wrongdoers do; He only defers them to a Day on which the eyes will stare (14:42).
For this reason He said here: So woe to those who disbelieve from the witnessing of a tremendous Day (19:37), that is: the Day of Resurrection. And it has come in the sound ḥadīth, agreed upon as to its soundness, from ʿUbādah ibn al-Ṣāmit (may God be pleased with him), who said: The Messenger of God (peace and blessings be upon him) said: “Whoever bears witness that there is no god but God alone, who has no partner, and that Muḥammad is His servant and His messenger, and that Jesus is the servant of God and His messenger and His word which He cast to Mary and a spirit from Him, and that Paradise is true and the Fire is true, God will admit him to Paradise, whatever his deeds may have been.”
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. The modern editors’ apparatus is not part of the classical text and is left untranslated; a second translator has not checked the rendering, and the Arabic is linked so that any passage can be compared.
The birth of Jesus (19:16-37): all commentaries · The classical commentaries
Notes
- Two canonical readings (qirāʾāt) of 19:19: li-yahaba, “that He may grant”, with God as the subject, and li-ahaba, “that I may grant”, with the angel speaking as God’s instrument. ↩
- Two readings of 19:24: man taḥtahā, making “the one beneath her” the subject who called, and min taḥtihā, “from beneath her”, the reading of the majority. ↩
- ʿAjwah is a prized variety of date, especially associated with Medina. ↩
- Ṣarafānah is a variety of date palm bearing hard, dense dates. ↩
- The variant readings of 19:25 differ in the form of the verb “drop”: tassāqaṭ and tasāqaṭ (the palm tree lets fall), tusāqiṭ (causative), and, in the reading ascribed to al-Barāʾ, the masculine form with the trunk (jidhʿ) as subject. ↩
- Exodus 15:20-21, where Miriam the sister of Aaron leads the women with timbrels. ↩
- The Qadariyyah, who denied that human actions are foreordained by God; Mālik’s point is that Jesus was told in his cradle what he would do until his death. ↩
- With the nominative the phrase is a predicate, “That is Jesus son of Mary: the word of truth…”; with the accusative it is read as an emphatic complement, “I say the word of truth”. ↩
- So the text; other transmissions of this report call this third party the Malkāniyyah (Melkites), the church of the Byzantine emperors, which is clearly what is meant by “the kings of the Christians”. ↩
- al-Amānah al-kabīrah, the Muslim historians’ name for the Nicene Creed; Ibn Kathīr puns on amānah (trust) and khiyānah (treachery). ↩
- Literally “the Dunghill”, the Muslim writers’ deliberate deformation of al-Qiyāmah, the Church of the Resurrection (the Holy Sepulchre) in Jerusalem. ↩