And when He, glorified and exalted is He, made clear to them the insignificance of their partners, what was their right regarding Him that they should return, yet they did not do so, He followed it up with what befell them as a punishment, unlike what had befallen their predecessors, as a consequence for the evil they committed, in an attempt to invoke repentance. He said: "Corruption has appeared" meaning the deficiency in all that benefits creation "in the land" through drought and fear and the like, "and in the sea" through drowning and the scarcity of benefits from fishing and similar things that used to be obtained before. Al-Baghawi said: The land refers to the deserts and wildernesses, and the sea refers to the cities and villages that are by the flowing waters. Ikrimah said: The Arabs call the city a sea. Then He clarified the reason for it by saying: "Because" and when the context was sufficient in indicating the evils without needing to elaborate, He said: "They have earned" meaning they have done (p-105) an evil deed that is from the intensity of their throwing themselves into it, even if it is in the slightest ways, as indicated by the emphasis on the action, as if it is poured out from a height, and from the intensity of the perfection of its evil, as if it is cast. And when most actions are done by hand, He attributed to it what is intended by the generality of all that has the ability to move, saying: "the hands of the people" meaning a punishment for them due to their actions. And when He mentioned its initial cause, He followed it with the consequential cause, saying: "So that We may make them taste" [Fussilat: 16] meaning by what We have of greatness, in the narration of Qunbul from Ibn Kathir with the noon to show the greatness in the tasting for some and the pardon for others. And the reading of the others with the lower case follows the tradition of the past grandeur; and He indicated His generosity, glorified is He, by saying: "some of what they have done" meaning its consequences and its heat and its burning, and He pardons much either fundamentally and primarily, or by hastening it and delaying it to a certain time in this world, or to the Hereafter. The intended reward is in accordance with the like of their deeds as a recompense for it, expressing the cause by the reason they brought to the people so that they may recognize when they have taken the wealth the measure of what they have tasted from that which they have taken. And if one of their relatives is killed, the intensity of what their relative suffers from the heat of what they have killed, and similar things from what they have belittled due to what they have brought upon others from severe harm while they are laughing and marveling at his distress and mocking, being heedless of the severity of what he suffers from various forms of burning, he and those who are dear to him, and his concern is important to him, and his hand has been restrained from assistance due to incapacity, and has been limited by weakness and oppression. Then He emphasized the ultimate cause by saying: "So that perhaps they may return" meaning to be in a state before the One who sees them, like one whose return is hoped from doing such an act out of fear that they may be returned to them with a similar recompense.