And when that was a cause for punishment, it was caused by His saying: ﴿So He poured﴾ (p-31). This means it was a pouring that is of the utmost strength ﴿upon them﴾, meaning in this world. ﴿Your Lord﴾, meaning the Benefactor to you, the Planner of your affairs, who made what has passed of the news of nations and the traces of sects a precursor for them. ﴿A whip of punishment﴾, meaning He made their punishment from drowning, earthquakes, and others at its time, and its strength, and its elevation, and its encompassing, like that which is poured in the intensity of its striking and its adherence to the struck, and its hastening to it, and its wrapping around it like a whip. And in its being varied into intertwined types, its origin is mixing. This braided whip that He strikes with is named so because it is mixed with the powers of some with others, and because it mixes flesh and blood. It is said: What He made permissible for them in this world is likened to the whip, indicating repetition and reiteration until the one punished by it perishes, and signaling that in comparison to what He has prepared for them in the Hereafter, it is like the whip when compared to the sword. This is the whip of this world, and the sword of the Hereafter is more severe, sharper, and more cutting. Then He explained His taking of every oppressor and His vengeance against every corrupter by saying that He is Watchful. He said, illustrating that the sinners do not escape Him, emphasizing a warning that the deeds of the one who denies that or does not think of it are: