His saying, exalted and glorified is He:

﴿And We guided them both to the straight path﴾ ﴿And We left for them in the latter generations﴾ ﴿Peace be upon Moses and Aaron﴾ ﴿Indeed, thus do We reward the good-doers﴾ ﴿Indeed, they were among Our believing servants﴾ ﴿And indeed, Elias was among the messengers﴾ ﴿When he said to his people, 'Will you not fear Allah?﴾ ﴿Do you invoke Baal and leave the best of creators?﴾

﴿The straight path﴾ means in this verse the path of the Shari'ah and prophethood that leads to Allah, the Most High. The saying has been previously mentioned in a similar manner: ﴿And We left for them in the latter generations﴾ ﴿Peace be upon Moses and Aaron﴾.

And Elias is a prophet from the prophets of Allah, the Most High. Qatadah and Ibn Mas'ud said: He is Idris, peace be upon him. Al-Tabari said: He is Elias ibn Yasin, ibn Finhas, ibn Al-Aizar, ibn Aaron, ibn Imran. A group said: He is from the descendants of Aaron, peace be upon him. The majority of the reciters read: ﴿And indeed, Elias﴾ with a broken hamzah, and it is a name. Ibn 'Amir, Ibn Muhaisin, 'Ikrimah, Al-Hasan, and Al-A'raj read: ﴿And indeed, Al-Yas﴾ without a hamzah and with the connection of the alif. This can be understood in one of two ways: Either he omitted the hamzah, as Ibn Kathir omitted it from his saying: [Indeed, it is one of the greatest], meaning: one of the greatest, and he treated the disjointed as if it were connected, as it can be treated in many matters, or he made it the alif that accompanies the lam for definition, like Al-Yasa. In the Mushaf of Ubayy ibn Ka'b, it is written: ﴿And indeed, Ilays﴾ with a broken hamzah and a silent ya after it and an opened sin. Similarly, it is in: [Peace be upon Ilays]. Nafi' and Ibn 'Amir read: "Peace be upon the family of Yasin," while the others read: "Peace be upon Elias" with a broken alif and a silent lam. Al-Hasan and Abu Raji' made it connected. The first view is that it is - in what they claim - disjointed in the Mushaf, which indicates that it means "the people of" and "Yasin" is also a name for Elias. It is said that it is a name for Muhammad, blessings and peace be upon him. The second view is that it is the plural of Elias, as they said: A'jamiyy is A'jamiyyun. Abu Ali said: The estimation is: Eliasiyyin, and it was omitted as it was omitted from A'jamiyyin, and similar to it from Ash'ariyyin, Numayriyyin, and Muhallabiyeen, and similar to them. Abu 'Amr narrated that a caller called on the day of Al-Kilab: The Yazidis have perished. The poet's saying is also narrated:

I have been granted victory from the support of Al-Khubayb,

with a broken bā, in reference to Abu Khubayb. It is said that every one of the family of Yasin was named Elias, as they said: His temples have turned gray, so every part of the temple was named a temple, and from this is their saying: "A camel with two humps." Based on this, Ibn Jinni recited:

We passed by the first of the Umus,

moving among us like the walk of a bride.

So every part of yesterday was named yesterday, then it was gathered. Abu Ubaidah said: He did not greet the family of any of the prophets mentioned before, therefore the reading of the one who recited: "Ilyasin" is preferred, as it is a single name for him. Ibn Mas'ud and Al-A'mash read: "And indeed Idris is among the messengers" and "Peace be upon Idrasin," which is a dialect for "Idris" like Ibrahim and Abraham.

And His saying: "Do you call upon?" means: Do you worship? And "the Ba'l": is the Lord in the language of Yemen, as said by Ikrimah and Qatadah. Ibn Abbas, may Allah be pleased with him, heard a man seeking a lost item, and another said to him: I am its Ba'l, so Ibn Abbas said: Allah is the Greatest. "Do you call upon Ba'l?" And Al-Dahhak, Ibn Zayd, and Al-Hasan said: Ba'l is the name of an idol they had, and it was said: Ba'l Bak, and to him the people were attributed. Ibn Ishaq mentioned from a group that "Ba'l" is the name of a woman who had come to them with misguidance. And His saying: "the best of creators" is in the sense that it was said of man, by way of metaphor: that he creates, and it must be that He, glorified and exalted is He, is the best of creators; for His creation is an invention and bringing into existence from nothing, and the creation of man is metaphorical, as the poet said:

And indeed you shape what you have created, and then the people create and do not shape.