His saying, exalted and majestic is He:

﴿So there came after them a generation who wasted the prayer and followed their desires. So they will meet a great loss﴾ ﴿Except for those who repent and believe and do righteous deeds. For those, they will enter Paradise and will not be wronged at all﴾ ﴿Gardens of Eternity, which the Most Merciful has promised His servants in the unseen. Indeed, His promise is coming﴾ ﴿They will not hear therein any ill speech except for peace, and they will have their provision therein morning and afternoon﴾ ﴿That is the Paradise which We will inherit from Our servants who were fearing﴾.

"The 'generation' - with the opening of the letter 'l' -: is the generation that comes after another that has passed, and the son after the father. It may also be used in other matters. And 'the generation' - with the letter 'l' being silent - refers to the one that is blameworthy. This is well-known in the speech of the Arabs. It has been mentioned by some of them that 'generation' and 'the generation' have the same meaning. The proof of this is the saying of the poet:

We have the first step towards You, and our generation follows our first in obedience to Allah.

The majority read: ﴿They wasted the prayer﴾ in the singular, while Al-Hasan read: "They wasted the prayers" in the plural. This is also the case in the Mushaf of Abdullah ibn Mas'ud, may Allah be pleased with him. The intended meaning of 'the generation' is those who disbelieved or sinned afterward from the Children of Israel. Mujahid said: The intended meaning is the Christians, who came after the Jews. Muhammad ibn Ka'b al-Qurazi, Mujahid, and Ata said: They are a people from the Ummah of Muhammad, blessings and peace be upon him, in the end of times.

That is: there will be in this Ummah one who has this description, not that they are the ones intended by this verse. Abu Sa'id al-Khudri, may Allah be pleased with him, narrated from the Prophet, blessings and peace be upon him, that he said: "The generation will come after sixty years."

The judge Abu Muhammad, may Allah have mercy on him, said: And this is known until the Day of Resurrection.

People have differed regarding "wasting the prayer" among them. Muhammad ibn Ka'b al-Qurazi and others said: It was the wasting of disbelief and denial of it. Al-Qasim ibn Mukhaimira and Abdullah ibn Mas'ud said: It was the wasting of its times and the failure to preserve its appointed times. Al-Tabari mentioned this from Umar ibn Abdul Aziz, may Allah be pleased with him, in a long hadith. And "the desires" is general, and everything mentioned from that is an example.

And "the great loss": is the loss and falling into calamities. From this is the saying of the poet:

So whoever meets good, people praise his affair, and whoever goes astray does not lack a reproacher for his loss.

With this, Ibn Zayd, may Allah have mercy on him, interpreted this verse. And it may also be that the great loss refers to misguidance, and here there is an omitted addition, the meaning of which is: "they will meet the recompense of loss." With this, Al-Zajjaj interpreted it. Abdullah ibn Umar and Abdullah ibn Mas'ud said: The great loss is a valley in Hell. And with this, the threat in this verse occurred. It was said: "The great loss and sins are two rivers in Hell," narrated by Abu Umamah al-Bahili, may Allah be pleased with him, from the Prophet, blessings and peace be upon him.

His saying: ﴿Except for one who repents﴾ is an exception that can be understood as connected or disconnected. And His saying: ﴿And believes﴾ implies that the addition, first, is the loss of disbelief. This is with the connection of the exception, and based on this, Al-Tabari explained it. The majority read: "They will enter" with a dammah on the ya and a fatha on the kha. Al-Hasan read all that is in the Qur'an as "They will enter" with a fatha on the ya and a dammah on the kha.

And His saying, the Exalted: ﴿Gardens of Eternity﴾, the majority of people read: "Gardens of Eternity" with the gardens in the accusative as a substitute for His saying: ﴿They will enter the garden﴾. Al-Hasan, 'Isa ibn 'Umar, and Abu Haywah read it in the nominative as a substitution for: that. And Ali ibn Abi Talib, may Allah be pleased with him, read: "Garden" in the singular and accusative, and likewise in the Mushaf of Abdullah ibn Mas'ud. Al-Amash also read it. And "Eternity" means continuous residence. His saying: ﴿In the unseen﴾ means: He informed them of that which was hidden from them. And in this is praise for them for their quickness of faith and their resolution since they did not witness it. And "the promised" is an object in its form, and "the coming" is the fulfillment and the action that is included in the promise. Its coming is intended by the promise that preceded it. A group of the interpreters said: It is an object in the expression meaning: coming.

Qadi Abu Muhammad, may Allah have mercy on him, said: This is far-fetched, and the first view is more correct.

And "the idle talk" is the fallacy in speech, and it is of various types, all of which are not in Paradise. And His saying: ﴿Except for peace﴾ is an interrupted exception, meaning: But they will hear peace, which is the greeting of the angels to them at all times. And His saying: ﴿Morning and evening﴾ means in estimation, that is: their food comes to them twice in the measure of the day and night of time. It is narrated that the doors of Paradise are closed to them in accordance with the night in this world, so they recognize the morning when it opens and the evening when it closes. Mujahid, may Allah have mercy on him, said: There is neither morning nor evening, but they will be brought what they used to desire in this world.

Qadi Abu Muhammad, may Allah have mercy on him, said: And Qatadah mentioned something similar, that it may be addressed in a manner that the Arabs know and find strange in the luxury of living. And he made that an expression that their provision comes in the most complete forms. Al-Hasan said: They were addressed in what the Arabs knew of the best living, and that is because many of the Arabs would find food once a day, and that was their limit. The living of most of them was from the wild trees and from animals and similar things. Do you not see the saying of the poet:

Or a meal from the gardens of various kinds ∗∗∗ If it is not made tempting by the bow, it will not be attained.

The meal is the morsel in the day.

And the majority read: "We will inherit" with the waaw being silent. Al-Hasan, Al-A'raj, and Qatadah read: "We will inherit" with a fatha on the waaw and a shaddah on the raa.