And when He, glorified and exalted is He, discouraged marriage to one who is characterized by fornication, whether man or woman, He began - because the marriage of a woman to the fornicator is a presumption of her fornication - by discouraging females with what implies the permissibility of declaring fornication against them by mere marriage to one known for his fornication. This was after He began in the punishment for fornication with the female as well, because her fornication is a greater evil and a greater disgrace and harm. He then added the prohibition of slander, which necessitates the magnification of the desire for concealment, protection of honor, and hiding of immoral acts. He said, mentioning the plural because the ruling of establishing the punishment upon him implies establishing the punishment upon the individual by extension, and there is no ambiguity in it. For when the plural is met with the plural, it implies distribution: "And those who accuse" meaning by fornication "the chaste women" is the plural of muhsanah, which here refers to the free, adult, chaste Muslim woman. The intended meaning is the slander of fornication as indicated by the context both preceding and following, whether the accusers are males or females, as understood from the connection. He specified the females even though the ruling is general for men, as a reminder of the great right of the Mother of the Believers, Aisha, may Allah be pleased with her, and because the words regarding them are more severe.

And when the act of the aggressor in slandering, with what he conditioned therein to avert the punishment, is distant from the intention of concealment, He referred to it with a tool of relaxation and said: "Then they did not come" meaning to the judge "with four witnesses" male witnesses. "So punish them" O believers, from the imams and their deputies, "with eighty lashes" for each one of them, for each chaste woman, if the slanderer is not originally one of them, if they are free. And the punishment for the slave is half of that, as stated in the verse of women: "So upon them is half of what is upon the chaste women of punishment" [An-Nisa: 25]. This verse is specific to that, as there is no distinction between male and female nor between the punishment for fornication and the punishment for slander. "And do not accept for them" meaning after their slander in this manner "any testimony" of any testimony whatsoever "forever" for the ruling of their falsehood. And whoever is proven to have lied, his words are no longer trusted.

And when the implication is: for indeed they have lied, He added to it a warning against acting without verification: "And those" meaning those whose slander has been previously condemned, so their rank is greatly lowered, "they are the wicked" meaning the one ruled to be wicked is established for them this description, even if the slanderer is correct in the essence of the matter.