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

Tafsir of Surah An-Nisa

'In the name of Allah, the Most Gracious, the Most Merciful', and may Allah send blessings and peace upon our master and lord Muhammad, and upon his family and companions, and grant them peace.

This surah is Medinan, except for one verse that was revealed in Mecca during the year of the conquest concerning Uthman ibn Talhah, which is His saying: ﴿Indeed, Allah commands you to render trusts to whom they are due﴾ [An-Nisa: 58]. Al-Naqqash said: It is said that the surah was revealed at the time of the migration of the Messenger of Allah, blessings and peace be upon him, from Mecca to the illuminated city of Medina.

Qadi Abu Muhammad, may Allah have mercy on him, said:

Some people have said that His saying, 'O mankind' wherever it occurs is Meccan, so it resembles that the beginning of this surah is Meccan, while what was revealed after the migration is Medinan, even if it was revealed in Mecca or during one of the journeys of the Prophet, peace be upon him. Al-Nahhas said: This surah is Meccan.

Qadi Abu Muhammad, may Allah have mercy on him, said:

There is no disagreement that in it there are verses that were revealed in Medina. In Al-Bukhari, the last verse revealed is: ﴿They ask you for a ruling. Say, Allah gives you a ruling concerning the one who has no direct heir﴾ [An-Nisa: 176]. He mentioned it in the tafsir of Surah [At-Tawbah] from the narration of Al-Bara' ibn Azib. In Al-Bukhari, 'Aisha said: The Surah An-Nisa was not revealed except while I was with the Messenger of Allah, blessings and peace be upon him, meaning that he had married her.

His saying, glorified and exalted is He:

﴿O mankind, fear your Lord, who created you from one soul and created from it its mate and dispersed from both of them many men and women. And fear Allah, through whom you ask one another, and the wombs [that bore you]. Indeed, Allah is ever, over you, Observer﴾

'O' is a particle of address, and 'O' is a singular vocative, and 'ha' is an indication, and 'mankind' is a description of 'O', or a connection according to the view of Abu al-Hasan al-Akhfash. And 'the Lord' means the Owner. And in the verse is an indication of the Creator and the commencement of existence, and in it is an encouragement to maintain the ties of kinship due to the sanctity of this lineage, even if it is distant. And He said: 'one soul', according to the feminine form of the word 'soul', and this is like the saying of the poet:

Your father is a caliph born of another, and you are a caliph; that is the perfection.

And Ibn Abi Abla read: 'from one soul' without the 'ha', and this is in consideration of the meaning, as the intended 'soul' is Adam, peace be upon him, as said by Mujahid, Qatadah, and others.

And 'creation' in the verse means invention, and by His saying: 'its mate' He means Hawwa (Eve), and 'mate' in the speech of the Arabs means the wife of a man, and it is said 'zawjah'. And from it is the house of Abu Firasa:

And indeed, the one who strives to corrupt my wife is like one who approaches the lions of the wild to seize her.

And His saying: 'from it', Ibn Abbas, Mujahid, Al-Suddi, and Qatadah said: Indeed, Allah, glorified and exalted is He, created Adam alone in Paradise, then he slept, and Allah took one of his shorter ribs from his left side, and it is said from his right side, and created from it Hawwa. And this saying is supported by the authentic hadith in which he, peace be upon him, said: 'Indeed, a woman was created from a rib; if you try to straighten her, you will break her, and breaking her is divorce.' And some of them said: The meaning of 'from it' is of its kind, and the wording encompasses both meanings, or her flesh and essence are from his rib, and her soul is of the kind of his soul.

'And He spread' means: He disseminated, as His saying, 'like the scattered moths' [Al-Qari'a: 4], meaning: the widespread ones. And limiting His offspring to two types: men and women implies that the hermaphrodite is not a type, and that even if we assume it to be problematic in appearance, it has a reality that returns it to one of these two types. In the repetition of the command to be conscious, there is an emphasis and a reminder for the souls of those commanded.

And 'the one who' is in the accusative position as an adjective, and 'you ask each other' means: you mutually solicit it, so one of you says: 'I ask you by Allah to do such and such and similar things.' A group said its meaning is: you ask about your rights and make it a means to obtain them. Its origin is: 'you ask each other,' so the second 't' was replaced with a 's' and it was assimilated into the 's.' This is the reading of Ibn Kathir, Nafi', Ibn Amir, and Ibn Amr, with a difference from him. The others read: 'you ask each other' with a softened 's,' because they omitted the second 't' for ease. Thus, this 't' of 'you interact' is assimilated in one language and omitted in another due to the gathering of similar letters. Abu Ali said: And when similar letters gather, they are eased by omission, assimilation, and substitution, as they said: 'Tast,' so they substituted a 't' for the single 's,' since the origin is 'Tass.' Al-Ajaj said:

If it were presented to Aiblian Qass, ∗∗∗ it would be disheveled in its structure.

He longed for it like the longing of the 'Tass.'

And Ibn Mas'ud said: 'You ask' lightly without an 'a,' and 'the wombs' is in the accusative position as an addition to the position of 'by it' because its position is accusative. The more apparent interpretation is that it is in the accusative due to an implied action whose meaning is: and be conscious of the wombs that you do not sever them. This is the reading of the seven except for Hamza, and upon it Ibn Abbas and others interpreted it. Abdullah Ibn Yazid read 'the wombs' in the nominative, and that is based on the beginning with a report that is implied, its meaning being: and the wombs are deserving of being maintained. Hamza and a group of scholars read 'the wombs' in the genitive as an addition to the pronoun, and their meaning is: indeed, it is asked about as a man says: 'I ask you by Allah and by the womb.' Thus, it was interpreted by Al-Hasan, Ibrahim Al-Nakha'i, and Mujahid. This reading is not permissible according to the leaders of the Basra grammarians, because it is not permissible for them to connect an apparent word to an implied one that is in the genitive. Al-Zajjaj said about Al-Mazini: because the connected and the connector are partners, each of which takes the place of its counterpart. Just as it is not permissible: 'I passed by Zayd and you,' likewise it is not permissible: 'I passed by you and Zayd.' As for Sibawayh, it is considered ugly and not permissible except in poetry, as he said:

So today you have spent the night insulting and reviling us ∗∗∗ so go, for what do you have to do with the days of wonder?

And as he said:

We hang our swords in the like of the pillars ∗∗∗ and between them and the ankle is a swamp of mud.

Some grammarians found it easy, and Abu Ali said: that is weak in analogy.

Qadi Abu Muhammad, may Allah have mercy on him, said:

The implied, reduced does not separate; it is like a letter from the word. It is not joined to a letter. This reading, in my view, has two meanings: one of them is that the mention of 'the wombs' in what is being questioned has no meaning in urging piety towards Allah, nor is there any benefit in it more than informing that the wombs are questioned. This is a distinction in the meaning of the words and a diminishment of its eloquence. Eloquence is only in that the mention of the wombs has an independent benefit. The second point is that mentioning it in that way affirms the questioning about it and the swearing by its sanctity. The authentic hadith refutes this in his saying, blessings and peace be upon him: 'Whoever is swearing, let him swear by Allah or remain silent.' A group said: He only reduced 'and the wombs' in the context of swearing by Allah regarding what He has specified, there is no deity except Him, from swearing by His creations. The thing sworn upon afterward is from His saying: 'Indeed, Allah is a Watcher over you.' This is a statement that the structure of the words and their narration does not accept, even if the meaning brings it out.

And 'was' in this verse is not only for defining the past, but the meaning is: it was and it is. The Watcher: is a noun for the doer from 'raqabah' meaning to observe with sight or insight towards something to verify it as it is. It is accompanied by preservation, witnessing, and knowledge of what results from the observation. In His saying 'upon you' is a type of warning, and He did not say 'for you' due to the sharing that would enter from the fact that He observes for them what others do. And from what we mentioned, it was said to the one who observes the exit of the arrow from the shaft in the lots: 'Watcher,' because he is waiting for that. And from it is the saying of Abu Dawood:

'Like the seats of the watchers for the archers, their hands are like claws.'