And when He described, glorified and exalted is He, their inner selves with what they despised in them, for indeed, a person is by his intellect just as food is by its appearance. They had forms that deceive the observer, for the Arabs used to say: the beauty of the appearance often indicates the goodness of the inner self. Allah, the Most High, said: "And when you see them" meaning, O Messenger, according to what you have of perception and insight, or, O observer, whoever you may be with the eye of sight, "you will be amazed by their bodies" due to their size and beauty. Their ultimate goal is all in the righteousness of their outward appearances and the indulgence of their souls. They are mere shadows and molds with no essence or realities behind them. Ibn Abbas, may Allah be pleased with him, said: Ibn Ubayy - meaning the one for whom the chapter was revealed - was a large, eloquent, and articulate man. There were a group of hypocrites with similar attributes, and they were the leaders of the city. They would attend the gathering of the Messenger of Allah, blessings and peace be upon him, and they would lean on him, and they had striking appearances and eloquent tongues. The Messenger of Allah, blessings and peace be upon him, and those present would be amazed by their physiques. And when He described the inner and outer selves, and their saying was: a person is by his two small organs, his heart and tongue, conditioned as is evident from the expression by the correspondence of the tongue to the heart. He expressed this with a tool of doubt, indicating that they do not speak to him, blessings and peace be upon him, except out of necessity, for they do not like to converse with him, nor is there any motivation for them to do so due to the diseases of their hearts. "And if they say" meaning there exists from them a saying at a time from the times, "you will hear their saying" meaning it will be such that it delights the hearing and pleases the mind for what is in it of flattery along with eloquence, for it captures the hearts.

And when He informed about their outward appearances, it indicated that this outward appearance is something that has no reality to it. And when they settled their souls on shamelessness and removed the garment of modesty with lies, they exerted all effort in beautifying the speech because there is no accountability upon them in it in what they assume, for they do not consider the Hereafter. So He said: "Like they are" meaning in the beauty of their appearances and the ugliness of their inner selves, and in cowardice and weakness and lack of benefit from them in anything of understanding or steadfastness, for they have no reality. "Wood" is a plural form indicating a multitude of pieces of wood, and it is indicative of their abundance. And when wood may sometimes refer to that which is planted, He negated that with His saying, emphasizing the abundance: "supported" meaning it has been cut from its roots, peeled, and propped against the walls so that the soil does not spoil it. They are white, attracting the amazement of the observer, and there is no stability for them, nor any essence with fruit, nor watering, so there is no heavenly support for them at all that purifies them with a type of purification. They have lost the spirit of affirmation by which their perfection is attained, just as the hypocrite has lost the spirit of faith by which the perfection of speech and its existence is attained. So in that state, they are shadows without souls, bodies without dreams.

And when the one who says what he does not do becomes suspected by everyone who speaks to him, because by his failure he has become their enemy, people imagine that all are enemies to him. This causes him to acquire the greatest cowardice. This is the greatest reason for the improvement of his words. He said: ﴿They think﴾ meaning due to their weak minds and the abundance of their doubts because of the many bad deeds they engage in. ﴿Every shout﴾ means from the call of a caller in the escape of a beast or the recitation of a lost thing, and similar to that. ﴿Upon them﴾ means it is a reality. And when the one who suspects the enmity of people towards him becomes an enemy to them, he said the result of what has passed: ﴿They are﴾ meaning specifically ﴿the enemy﴾ meaning the complete enemy as indicated by the report of the singular that applies to the plural without the plural, pointing to the fact that they - in their intensity of enmity towards peace and its people and the completeness of their intent and the intensity of their striving in it - are of one heart, even if they show affection in speech and seek closeness to the people of Islam. Their tongues are with you when they meet you, but their hearts are with your enemies, for they are spies for them against you.

And when this is evident from the bad state of affairs, it caused his saying: ﴿So beware of them﴾ because the worst of enemies is the enemy who flatters you while beneath his ribs is a persistent disease. For whoever feels that you are an enemy to him will plot against you. The majority of those whose words please you in this description will be, but he [will be] with the grace of Allah always in disgrace, turned upside down in most of his situations by the hand of oppression and deprivation due to the secret of His saying, the Exalted: ﴿May Allah fight them﴾ meaning He has placed them in the position of one who fights against a conquering enemy with the utmost fighting according to the usual practice that occurs between two.

And when their condition is in the utmost wonder in their turning away from Islam firstly (p-83) due to blindness to the evident signs, and secondly to the news of their secrets, and the hidden plotting and news of theirs, and in their not turning away from what they are upon of the ugliness of their secrets and the badness of their intentions by reversing their aims, and thwarting their sources in their plotting and provisions, this is indicated by His saying: ﴿How﴾ meaning how and from which aspect ﴿are they turned away﴾ meaning what is causing them to be turned away from realizing the ugliness of what they are upon, that there is something that exists that would make them return from it to the goodness of the religion and the comfort in it and the realization of its blessings and its great effects.