﴿Or﴾ Al-Asbahani said: The Imam said: A word placed for questioning about something while being conjoined to another, whether the conjunction is mentioned or implied. This is concluded. And the original was: They thought, but he [turned away] from it to indicate that the commission of evil blinds the insight and weakens the intellect, as indicated by the expression of thinking, as previously explained in Al-Baqarah. So he said: ﴿Did those who committed﴾ meaning: they acted with the utmost of their effort and the inclination of their desires ﴿evil deeds think that We would make them﴾ along with what We have of greatness that prevents injustice, necessitating wisdom ﴿like those who believed and did﴾ confirming their acknowledgment outwardly and inwardly, secretly and openly ﴿righteous deeds﴾ by leaving them without accounting for the separation between the good-doer and the wrongdoer.

And when the comparison was general, he clarified them by resuming with his saying, presenting what is the essence of (p-91) the intended meaning of the first sentence: ﴿Equal﴾ meaning: equal in a great equality ﴿is their life and their death﴾ meaning: their life and death, and the time and place of that in elevation and decline, pleasure and distress, and other than that from the realities and meanings. And when this is something that no one would accept for those under their authority or for others, he said expressing with a totality of blame: ﴿How evil is what they judge﴾ meaning: their judgment has reached this in itself, especially as they persist in it, renewing it every hour to the utmost extremes of evil. So it is something to be wondered at, for the one who carries it does not know, and that is because they attributed the Wise One, who in truth has no wise other than Him, to what the least of people would not do for those under their authority.