His saying, exalted and majestic is He: "And to 'Aad, their brother Hud said, 'O my people, worship Allah. You have no deity other than Him. You are nothing but inventors (of lies)." "O my people, I do not ask you for it any reward. My reward is only from the One who created me. Will you not understand?" "And O my people, seek forgiveness from your Lord, then repent to Him. He will send the heavens upon you in showers and increase you in strength upon your strength. And do not turn away as criminals.'"

"And to 'Aad" is a conjunction to His saying: "to their people" in the story of Noah. "'Aad" is a tribe and it is mentioned that they were Arabs. "Hud," peace be upon him, was one of them. He made him "their brother" according to lineage and kinship. If we assume he was not from them, then the brotherhood is according to origin, language, and neighborhood. As for the saying of those who said: "It is a brotherhood according to human lineage," this is weak.

The majority of people read: "O my people" with a kasra on the meem, while Ibn Muhaisin read: "O my people" with a damma on the meem, which is a language reported by Sibawayh. The majority of people read: "other than Him" with a raf' on the noun as an adjective or substitute from the position of His saying: "from a deity." Al-Kisai alone read it with a kasra on the ra, following the pronunciation of: "deity," and that is also on the adjective or substitute. It is permissible for "other than Him" to be in the accusative as an exception.

And "inventors (of lies)" means: liars, in the most extreme sense, in making deities for others than Allah, exalted and majestic is He. The pronoun in His saying: "for it" refers back to the call to Allah, blessed and exalted is He. The meaning is: my reward and recompense is only from Allah, exalted and majestic is He. Then he described Him by saying: "the One who created me," making it a description that refutes them in their worship of their idols and their belief that they act. Thus, the description was placed in the context of his speech, alerting them to the actions of Allah, exalted and majestic is He, and that He is the One who deserves worship. And "created" means: invented and initiated. And His saying: "Will you not understand?" is a stopping point on the claim that other than the Creator is a deity. It is possible that he means: Will you not understand since I did not ask for a worldly benefit? I only seek your benefit and the Hereafter, and the first is more apparent.

And "seeking forgiveness" is the request for pardon, and it may be by the tongue, and it may be by the turning of the heart and seeking guidance and striving for the existence of the clear path. These are states that can occur from the disbelievers. It is as if he said to them: seek the forgiveness of Allah by turning back, and seek proof in my prophethood. Then repent with faith from your disbelief. The order here is straightforward; otherwise, it would require much manipulation in the order of repentance after seeking forgiveness. It may be that: (repent) is a command for continuity, and "seeking forgiveness" is the request for pardon with faith. To this, Al-Tabari went. And Abu al-Ma'ali said in the Irshad: "Repentance" in the terminology of the speakers is regret, after he said: it is in the language a return. Then he built upon this that the disbeliever, when he believes, his belief is not repentance, but rather his repentance is his regret afterward.

Qadi Abu Muhammad, may Allah have mercy on him, said:

And what I say is: "Indeed, repentance is a covenant in leaving that which is repented from, preceded by knowledge of the corruption of that which is repented from and the righteousness of what is returned to. It is accompanied by regret for the past of that which is repented from, which does not cease, and it is one of its conditions." So I say: The faith of the disbeliever is his repentance from his disbelief, for it is the same as his return.

And "taba" in the speech of the Arabs means: he returned to obedience and the best of matters. The use of the word in the Qur'an with "to" necessitates that it is a return, not regret. However, there is no necessary right for repentance as we have said. The reality of repentance is leaving what one repents from with a determined intention on what we have explained, and Allah is the one sought for help.

And "midraran" is a broken plural form, and its rightful form should have a "hā'" attached to it, but it was omitted on the intention of lineage and because the sky, the rain itself, is from it. It is from "darra yadruru" and "mif'al" could be from the name of the doer which is from the trilateral, and from the name of the doer which is from the quadrilateral. The saying of those who said: "It is more binding for the quadrilateral" is not binding.

It is narrated that "ʿĀd" was a people from whom Allah, the Exalted, had withheld rain for three years. They were people of agriculture, gardens, and fruits, and their land was east of the Arabian Peninsula. For this reason, He promised them rain, and from that was their joy when they saw the cloud, and their saying: "This is a cloud bringing us rain" [Al-Ahqaf: 24]. And He urged them to seek the rain through faith and repentance. This is the custom of Allah with His servants, and from it is the saying of Nuh, peace be upon him: "Seek forgiveness from your Lord, indeed, He is Most Forgiving" [Nuh: 10] "He will send the sky upon you in abundance" [Nuh: 11]. And from it is the action of Umar, may Allah be pleased with him, when he made all of his words in seeking rain and his supplication for forgiveness, and he was granted rain. He was asked about that, and he said: "I have sought the rain with the keys of the heavens."

And His saying: "And He will increase you in strength to your strength" has an apparent generality in all that Allah, the Exalted, does good for His servants. A group said: Allah, the Exalted, had withheld their offspring, so the meaning of His saying: "And He will increase you in strength to your strength" is the children. It is possible that He specified strength with mention since they were the strongest of the worlds, so they were promised an increase in what they excelled in. Then He forbade them from turning away from the truth and neglecting the command of Allah. And "mujrimin" is a state of the pronoun in "tatavallaw."