His saying, glorified and exalted is He:

﴿Indeed, the Hour is coming; I almost conceal it so that every soul may be recompensed for what it strives for﴾ ﴿So let not one who does not believe in it and has followed his desire divert you from it, and thus you perish﴾ ﴿And what is that in your right hand, O Musa?﴾ ﴿He said, It is my staff; I lean on it, and I beat down leaves with it for my sheep, and I have therein other uses﴾

In His saying, the Most High: ﴿Indeed, the Hour is coming﴾ is a warning and a threat, meaning: worship Me, for My punishment and reward are in wait. And

The 'lam' in His saying, the Most High: "to be recompensed" is related to His saying: "coming", and thus is the arrangement of the warning. And "it strives" means: it earns and acquires. The pronoun in His saying, the Most High: ﴿So let it not turn you away from it﴾, refers back to "the Hour", meaning: belief in the Hour, so He placed the pronoun upon it. It is also possible that it refers back to the prayer. A group said: it refers to "there is no deity except Allah".

(p-87) Al-Qadi Abu Muhammad, may Allah have mercy on him, said: This is a valid direction, and the first two are clearer in meaning.

And His saying, the Most High: "so it will perish" means: it will be destroyed, and "the perishing" is destruction. From this is the saying of Durayd ibn al-Simmah:

They called out and said: The horses have perished a knight ∗∗∗ So I said: Is that the wretched one, O servant of Allah?

And all this address is to Musa, peace be upon him, and likewise what follows. Al-Nikash said: The address in His saying: ﴿So let it not turn you away from it﴾ is to Muhammad, blessings and peace be upon him, and this is far-fetched. In the Mushaf of Abdullah ibn Mas'ud, may Allah be pleased with him, it is: "I am almost hiding it from myself", and upon this reading that previous saying is constructed.

And His saying, the Most High: ﴿And what is that in your right hand, O Musa?﴾ its implication and what is contained in it is a reminder and the gathering of the self to receive what is presented to it. Otherwise, Allah, the Most High, already knew what it was from eternity. And His saying: "in your right hand" is an attachment to "that", and this is analogous to the saying of the poet:

Adas! What authority do you have over the worshippers? ∗∗∗ You have escaped and this one carries you free.

Ibn al-Jawhari said: It has been narrated in some reports that Allah, the Most High, reproached Musa for attributing the staff to himself in that instance, so it was said to him: "Throw it" so that he may see the wonder from it and know that he has no ownership over it and it does not belong to him.

And Al-Hasan and Abu Amr - with a difference from him - read: "my staff" with a kasrah on the 'ya' like "my boy", and a group read: "staff", which is the language of Hudhayl, and from it is the saying of Abu Dhuhayb:

They surpassed my passion and they bowed to their passion ∗∗∗..............

And the majority read: "my staff" with a fatha on the 'ya', and likewise Ibn Abu Ishaq read: "my staff" with a silent 'ya'.

Then Musa, peace be upon him, mentioned the benefits of his staff, its greatness and multitude, and summarized all of that. And the majority read: "and I drive" with a dammah on the 'ha' and the 'sheen' with dots, and its meaning is: I shake the trees with it until the leaves spread for the sheep. And Ibrahim al-Nakha'i read: "and I drive" with a kasrah on the 'ha', and the meaning is as previously mentioned. And Ikrimah, the freedman of Ibn Abbas, may Allah be pleased with them both, read: "and I drive" with a dammah on the 'ha' and a 'seen' without dots, and its meaning is: I scare them and frighten them. And a group read: "upon my sheep" in the genitive case, and a group read: "upon my sheep" placing the action upon the sheep. And a group read: "my sheep" with a silent 'noon', and I do not know a reason for it. And His saying: "another" - he used the singular with the preceding plural - is the term used in reference to the followers of the plural of what does not have reason and the metaphor for it, for that is treated like the feminine singular, as in His saying: ﴿the best names﴾ [Ta-Ha: 8], and as in His saying: ﴿O mountains, respond with him﴾ [Saba: 10], and the saying in this meaning has passed multiple times.

And the staff of Musa, blessings and peace be upon him, is the one that he took from the house of the staffs of the prophets that was with Shu'ayb, blessings and peace be upon him, when they agreed on the grazing. And the staff of Adam, blessings and peace be upon him, was brought down with him from Paradise, and it was from the eye that is in the leaves of the basil, and it is the elongated body in its center. The explanation of its matter has been mentioned previously.