And when he mentioned the sending down of provision in this manner, and there were among the people those whom misguidance had forsaken, who say: 'Indeed, people are only in rain and vegetation and the extraction of sustenance, it is only the habit of time,' he clarified that he, glorified and exalted is He, is the doer of that by His power and choice, as it is like the sun in that He may withhold rain from its time and return it at its appointed time, until people despair of it, then He sends it down if He wills. He said expressing with the pronoun which is hidden because the sending down of rain is from the keys of the unseen: 'And He' meaning no one else is capable of that, for He is 'the One who sends down rain' meaning the rain by which people are aided, that is, they are responded to in what they asked for and they are aided visibly as revelation descends upon them, by which they are aided visibly and inwardly.

And when the sending down does not take up the time of despair, He included the neighbor and said: 'After they had despaired,' meaning they had lost hope in its sending down and knew that no one else is capable of sending it down, nor is anyone else intended in it, so that this would be more conducive for them to gratitude and He spreads it - thus was the origin, but when He clarified that it is rain, He said to clarify that it is a mercy, and to generalize its effect from vegetation and others: 'And He spreads His mercy' meaning upon the plain and the mountain, so He sends down from the clouds carried by the wind from the water that fills the earth, such that if all creatures gathered upon it, they would not be able to bear it, so the earth becomes between ponds and rivers, and vegetation and stars, and trees, and grains and fruits, and other than that from the small and great benefits. To Allah belongs the highest of this magnificent power and the evident sign, so there emerges from the earth, which is so solid that tools cannot manage it, a produce that is softer than silk in its softness, and more delicate than the breeze in its gentleness, and from the market of trees, which bend in it the beaks, branches softer than the tongues of the birds. How foolish is he who denies His bringing forth the dead from the graves, or deviates from that with a kind of delusion.

And when he denied upon them previously taking a guardian besides Him with His saying, 'Or have they taken besides Him guardians?' [Ash-Shura: 9] and affirmed that He is the guardian, and made Himself known to them by His signs which contained the manifestations of His lights, and all of them were in the utmost perfection necessitating continuous praise, he said: 'And He' meaning alone, no one else 'is the guardian' meaning the one who no one is closer to His servants in anything of the matters. 'The Praiseworthy' meaning the one who deserves the totality of praise, while He praises those who obey Him, so He increases them from His grace and connects (p-312) His bond with them always with His bond.