His saying, exalted and majestic is He:

﴿And among the people are those who say, 'We have believed in Allah and in the Last Day,' but they are not believers﴾ ﴿They seek to deceive Allah and those who believe, but they deceive not except themselves and perceive [it] not﴾

The original form of the letter 'n' is that it should be broken due to the meeting, but it is opened with the 'alif' and 'lam.' Whoever said that two breaks are heavy to occur in a word consisting of two letters is objecting with their saying: 'from your son' and 'from your name' and similar to it. The grammarians differed regarding the word 'people.' Some said: it is from 'forgot,' so the origin of 'people' is 'forgot' which turned into 'nīs,' the 'yā' moved and the letter before it opened, thus it turned into 'alif,' so it was said: 'people.' Then the 'alif' and 'lam' entered. Others said: 'people' is a name from the names of plurals without this explanation, and the 'alif' and 'lam' entered upon it. Others said: the origin of 'people' is 'humans,' the 'alif' and 'lam' entered in 'humans,' the hamzah was omitted, so it became 'people,' the 'lam' was assimilated into the 'n' due to the proximity of the exits.

And this verse was revealed about the hypocrites.

And His saying, exalted is He: ﴿Who say, 'We have believed in Allah'﴾ returned from the singular form to the plural form according to the wording of 'min' and its meaning, and this is good, because the singular precedes the plural in rank. It is not permissible for a speaker to return from the plural wording to the singular. If you said: 'And among the people are those who stand and speaks,' it would not be permissible. And Allah, exalted is He, named the Day of Resurrection the Last Day because there is no night after it, and a day is not called a day except that a night precedes it. Then He negated faith from the hypocrites, and in that is a refutation against the Karamiyyah in their saying: 'Indeed, faith is a saying with the tongue even if one does not believe in the heart.'

And the interpreters differed in His saying, exalted is He: ﴿They seek to deceive Allah﴾. Al-Hasan ibn Abi al-Hasan said: the meaning is that they seek to deceive the Messenger of Allah, so he attributed the matter to Allah as a figure of speech due to the connection of His Messenger to it. Their deceiving refers to their preventing the Messenger of Allah and the believers from knowing their secrets, so they protect themselves from what they dislike and become aware of the harm of the believers regarding what they love. A group of the interpreters said: rather, they seek to deceive Allah and the believers, and that is by showing faith while concealing disbelief, so that they may preserve their blood and secure their wealth, and they think that they have escaped and deceived and succeeded, but they have only deceived themselves, for they will end up in punishment, and they do not perceive that.

And the readers differed in the second 'they seek to deceive.' Ibn Kathir, Nafi, and Abu Amr read 'they seek to deceive,' while Asim, Ibn Amer, Hamzah, and Al-Kisai read 'and they deceive.' Abu Talut, Abd al-Salam ibn Shaddad, and Al-Jarud ibn Abi Sabrah read 'they deceive' with a dammah on the 'yā.' Qatadah and Murriq al-Ijli read 'they deceive' with a dammah on the 'yā,' a fatha on the 'khā,' and a kasrah on the 'dāl' with shaddah. The reading of Ibn Kathir and those who mentioned it is to achieve the correspondence of the wording, and that the second action is named after the first action that causes it, and this comes as the poet said:

'Let no one be ignorant of us, lest we become more ignorant than the ignorance of the ignorant.'

(p-117) So his victory was made ignorance. This tendency in this verse is supported by the fact that 'fa'il' can come from one, like I punished the thief and I struck the sandal. This reading also indicates that what comes to their minds and what occurs in their thoughts about entering the religion, and hypocrisy in it, and disbelief in the matter and its opposite in this meaning is like the conversation of two foreigners, so the action would be as if it is from two. The poet said: Remember from where and from where his drinking is, he commands his two souls like the one who has a sudden attack. Ibn al-A'rabi recited: You do not know what you do not say, may your life be long until the end of eternity. And you did not command your two souls while doubting in it and in its sister, nor did you almost. Another said: He commands his two souls and in life there is ample space. Will the two worms return or will he not develop them? Thaalab recited from Ibn al-A'rabi: And I was like the one with the delicate nature, you did not know when it suddenly attacked, commanding its two souls, will it be stolen or will it commit adultery? And the reading of Asim and those who mentioned that this action is deception for themselves that goes on them, you say: I deceived the man meaning I worked the trick on him, so I deceived him meaning: the trick was completed on him, and the intention was fulfilled in him. The source is deception with a broken 'kha' and 'khadi'a'. Abu Zayd narrated this. So the meaning of the verse is: And what they execute of evil is only upon themselves and in it. (p-118) And the reading of Abu Talut is one of two matters: either to estimate the speech and that they deceive only themselves, so the preposition was omitted and the action was connected. As He, the Exalted, said: 'And Musa chose his people' [Al-A'raf: 155], meaning: from his people. Or it could be that 'they deceive' means they perform an action that diminishes, when the meaning is: And what they nullify and take away is only themselves. An example of this is the saying of Allah, the Exalted: 'During the night of fasting, approach your wives' [Al-Baqarah: 187], and you do not say: I approached the woman, but when it was in the meaning of intimacy, that was permissible. And from it is His saying, the Exalted: 'Do you have any desire to purify yourself?' [An-Nazi'at: 18]. It is said: Do you have any desire in such and such, but when the meaning was: I draw you to purify yourself, that was permissible and good. This is a noble aspect of eloquence in speech. And from it is the saying of Al-Farazdaq: How do you see me, a molded one, certainly Allah has killed Ziyad for me. When the killing has entered into the meaning of turning away, and from it is the saying of another: If the sons of Qushayr are pleased with me, by the life of Allah, I am pleased with her pleasure. When the meaning of 'pleased' has included the meaning of 'approached me'. As for Al-Kisai, he said about this verse: 'Pleased' is connected to the opposite of it, which is 'displeased', and matters in the tongue can run in the course of their opposites. (p-119) And the reading of Qatadah indicates exaggeration in deception, as it leads to the punishment of Allah. Al-Khalil said: It is said: He deceived from one because in deception there is a delay, as it is said: I treated the sick due to the place of delay. Qadi Abu Muhammad, may Allah have mercy on him, said:

And this is from the subtlety of his observation. It is as if he refers the doer to the two, and there must be, from where there is a delay, a defense, and a procrastination. It is as if he resists in the meaning in which the doer comes.

And His saying, the Exalted, ﴿And they do not perceive﴾ means: And they do not know with a knowledge of awareness and understanding. It is a term taken from the concept of a sign, as if the thing that is aware has a sign for the soul. And a sign is the garment that is close to the body of a person, and it is derived from hair. And the poet who is aware of strange meanings, and their saying 'I wish I knew' means: I wish my awareness could be grasped. From this meaning is the saying of the poet:

A shot was taken, and no one felt it, then they rejoiced and said: How good is the dawn.

And there is a difference: What is it that Allah has denied them from perceiving? A group said: And they do not perceive that the harm of that deception returns to them because of their eternity in the Fire. Others said: And they do not perceive that Allah uncovers to you their secret and their deception in their saying: We have believed.