'In the name of Allah, the Most Gracious, the Most Merciful'

Tafsir of Surah As-Saffat

It is a Makki surah, and its count in the Madani, Shami, and Kufi traditions is one hundred and two verses and eighty verses.

His saying, exalted is He:

﴿And those who stand in rows﴾ ﴿And those who drive away with a sternness﴾ ﴿And those who recite the remembrance﴾ ﴿Indeed, your God is One﴾ ﴿Lord of the heavens and the earth and whatever is between them, and Lord of the east﴾ ﴿Indeed, We have adorned the lowest heaven with an adornment of stars﴾ ﴿And as a protection from every rebellious devil﴾

Allah, exalted is He, swore in these verses by some of His creations. The people have differed in their meanings. Ibn Mas'ud, Masruq, and Qatadah said: They are the angels who stand in the sky in the worship of Allah, exalted is He, and in His remembrance in rows. A group said: It refers to everyone who stands in rows from the children of Adam in fighting in the way of Allah or in prayer and obedience. The meaning is: and the groups that stand in rows, and the wording can encompass these mentioned.

'And those who drive away with a sternness,' Mujahid and Al-Suddi said: They are the angels who drive away the clouds and other creations of Allah. Qatadah said: They are the verses of the Qur'an that contain the legal prohibitions.

And His saying: ﴿And those who recite the remembrance﴾ means: the reciters. Mujahid and Al-Suddi said: It refers to the angels who recite His remembrance. Qatadah said: It refers to the children of Adam who recite His revealed books, and His glorification and magnification, and similar to that.

Abu Amr and Hamzah read [And those who stand in rows] with idgham, which is the reading of Ibn Mas'ud, (p-271) and Masruq, and Al-A'mash. The rest read and the majority of the people read with izhar, and likewise in all of them. Abu Hatim said: 'And izhar is our choice,' and as for 'the bearers of burdens' and 'the runners with ease,' idgham is not permissible in them due to the distance of the ت from the two letters.

Then He, exalted is He, clarified what He swore by, that it is His oneness, and that He is One, meaning: unified in all the directions in which the thinker looks. Then He described Himself with His lordship over all creations, and mentioned ﴿'the east'﴾ because they are the places of the lights, and the eyes have more to do with them. In mentioning it, there is sufficiency in mentioning the west; for its counterpart has a meaning understood by every person of understanding. And He, blessed and exalted, meant the places of the sun, which are one hundred and eighty in the year, as they claim, from the longest days of the year to the shortest. Then He informed about His power in adorning the sky with stars, and it is included in that adornment that He made it a protection and a guard from the rebellious devils, who are those who eavesdrop.

The majority read by adding "the adornment" to "the stars." Hamzah and Hafs from Asim read with the tanween of (adornment) and the genitive case of (the stars) as a substitute for it. This is the reading of Ibn Mas'ud, Masruq - with a difference from him - Abu Zur'ah ibn Umar ibn Jarir, Ibn Wathab, and Talhah. Abu Bakr read from Asim: "with adornment" with the tanween [the stars] in the accusative case. This is the reading of Ibn Wathab, Abu Amr, Al-A'mash, and Masruq. This in the grammar is similar to His saying, the Most High: "Or feeding on a day of hunger" [Al-Balad: 14] "an orphan of noble birth" [Al-Balad: 15]. Al-Zahrawi reported a reading with tanween: "adornment" and the nominative of "the stars."

And "the rebellious" refers to one who is stripped of good, and from it: a tree that is bare, meaning: it has no leaves on it, and from it: the youth. The Most High specifically mentioned the lower heaven because it is the one that is directly observed by our eyes. Also, the protection from the devil is only in it alone. And "protection" is in the accusative case as a source, and it is said: it is an object for its sake, and the waw is extra.