For a prophet for them, he is Joshua or Shimon or Samuel. Send us a king so that we may fight with him. A leader under whom we can manage the war by his opinion and we will adhere to his command. They requested from their prophet something similar to what the Messenger of Allah, blessings and peace be upon him, used to do by appointing leaders over the armies he prepared, and commanding them to obey him and comply with his orders.

It has been narrated that he commanded the people, when they traveled, to appoint one of them as a leader over them. 'Let us fight' is read with the pronoun and in the imperative form as a response. And with the pronoun and in the nominative as a state, meaning send him to us while we are preparing for battle. Or it could be an initiation as if he said to them: What will you do with the king? They said: We will fight. And it is read: 'he will fight' with the pronoun and in the imperative as a response, and in the nominative as a description of the king. The news of 'perhaps you will not fight' and the condition is a separation between them. The meaning is: Have you nearly come to not fight? Meaning, is the matter as I expect that you will not fight? He wanted to say: Perhaps you will not fight, meaning I expect your cowardice in battle, so he included 'have' as a question about what he expects and assumes. He intended by the question to affirm and establish that the expected is occurring, and that he is correct in his expectation. As in His saying: 'Has there not come upon man?' its meaning is affirmation. And it is read 'perhaps you will not fight' with a broken 's' which is weak. And what reason do we have not to fight? And what purpose do we have in it when we have been expelled from our homes and our children? This is because the people of Goliath used to inhabit the coast of the Sea of Rome between Egypt and Palestine, and they captured from the sons of their kings four hundred and forty except for a few of them. It is said that the few among them were three hundred and thirteen, the number of the people of Badr. And Allah is All-Knowing of the wrongdoers, a warning to them for their injustice in sitting out of the battle and abandoning jihad.