A calamity has struck you, meaning: what struck them on the day of Uhud from the killing of seventy among them. You have inflicted a similar number on the day of Badr, from the killing of seventy and the capturing of seventy. And (when) is in the accusative because of (you said). And (a calamity has struck you) is in the genitive case by adding (when) to it, and its meaning is: you said when a calamity struck you. And how this is in the accusative because it is said, and the hamzah is for confirmation and reprimand.

If you say: What is the conjunction of this sentence with the previous one? I say: It is connected to what has passed from the story of Uhud from His saying: (And certainly Allah has fulfilled His promise to you). It may also be connected to something omitted, as if it were said: Did you do such and such and say at that time such and such, how is this: from where is this? Like His saying: (How is this for you?) from your own selves and His saying: (From Allah). The meaning is: You are the cause of what has struck you, due to your choice to leave the city, or for your abandonment of the position.

And from Ali, may Allah be pleased with him: For taking the ransom from the captives of Badr before you were permitted, indeed Allah is capable of all things. He is capable of victory and of preventing it, and of striking you at one time and striking from you at another time. And what struck you on the day of Uhud, the day your groups met and the groups of the polytheists, it is to be, by the permission of Allah, meaning by His allowing the disbelievers, and that He did not prevent them from you to test them. For the one who permits is one who allows the permitted to act according to his intention. And to know, and it is to be, to distinguish the believers from the hypocrites, and to manifest the faith of these and the hypocrisy of those.

And it was said to them as part of the connection, it is connected to (they were hypocrites), and it was not said (they said) because it is an answer to a question that was necessitated by the believers' calling them to fight, as if it were said: So what did they say to them? It was said: They said: If we knew. And it is permissible for the connection to be limited to: (they were hypocrites).

And (and it was said to them) is an introductory statement dividing the matter between fighting for the Hereafter as the believers fight, and fighting if there is no concern for the Hereafter, to defend themselves, their families, and their wealth. They refused to fight and denied their ability to do so outright due to their hypocrisy and their deceit. And it is reported that Abdullah ibn Ubayy withdrew with his allies, and it was said to him, and he said that. And it was said: Or repel the enemy by increasing the number of the fighters even if you do not fight, because the increase in numbers is something that terrifies the enemy and breaks them. And from Sahl ibn Sa'd al-Sa'idi - and he had lost his sight -:

If it were possible for me, I would sell my house and join a front among the fronts of the Muslims, so I could be between them and their enemy. It was said: And how could you do that when your sight is gone? He said regarding His saying: (Or defend yourselves) he meant: increase their numbers. Another interpretation is that their saying, 'If we knew of fighting,' means that if we knew what could be called fighting, we would follow you. They mean that what you are in is a mistake of your opinion and a deviation from the truth; it is nothing, and such a thing cannot be called fighting. It is merely throwing oneself into destruction, because the view of Abdullah was to remain in Medina, and he did not see it right to go out. They were closer to disbelief on that day than to faith, meaning that before that day they were pretending to have faith, and no sign of disbelief appeared from them. But when they withdrew from the army of the believers and said what they said, they distanced themselves from the faith that was expected of them and drew closer to disbelief. It was said that they were closer to aiding the disbelievers than to aiding the believers, because their reducing the number of Muslims by withdrawing strengthened the polytheists. They say with their mouths that their faith does not go beyond their mouths, and their hearts do not retain anything from it. Mentioning the mouths with the hearts illustrates their hypocrisy, and that their faith exists in their mouths but is absent in their hearts, contrary to the description of the believers, where their hearts align with their mouths. And Allah knows best what they conceal of hypocrisy and what some of them say about the believers, belittling them, making them ignorant, criticizing their opinions, rejoicing in their misfortunes, and other things, because you know some of that in a general way through signs, and I know all of it in detail and its specifics. Those who said it has various interpretations: it could be in the accusative case as a form of blame or in response to those who were hypocrites, or in the nominative case as those who said it or as a substitution for the waw in 'they conceal.' It may also be in the genitive case as a replacement for the pronoun in 'with their mouths' or 'in their hearts,' like the saying:

'On his generosity, Hatim was stingy with water.'

When we met for sharing water, I was moved to tears... to the folds of the grapevines.

He came with a boulder like his head... to drink the water of the people among the sandbanks.

In a situation where if there were Hatim among the people... with his well-known generosity, he would have been stingy with water.

This is by Al-Farazdaq, apologizing for what happened to him during the journey with his guide, Asim Al-Anbari, when he lost his way. 'Tasafun' means sharing the little water by the 'safun,' which is a small container for ablution. 'Adawat' is a water vessel, and its plural is 'adawi.' The act of 'tasafun' on it is a mental metaphor because it is the place of the water they shared. It is closer to being a metonymy for what is in it. 'Jahsh' and 'ijhash' refer to a person's supplication to another and their preparation to cry to them like a child to its mother. 'Ghudun' refers to the skin's folds. It is narrated as 'eyes.' Attributing 'ijhash' to them is a mental metaphor because it is the place where its effect appears. 'Jaradim' means one with a large belly and who eats a lot. The intended meaning of 'jalmud' is a large, hard container like his head, meaning the Anbari. It hints at his foolishness, because an excessive head in size is a sign of dullness. The hardness also hints at that. 'To drink' means to take the water of the people among the sandbanks, the plural of 'sarima,' which is a stretch of sand or a herd of camels, indicating that they were in a desolate area with no water in a difficult situation. If it were established in that condition that Hatim was among the people with his famous generosity, he would have been stingy with water. 'On' means 'in,' and this is supported by Al-Mubarrad's narration in his complete work: 'In a situation.' Hatim - in the genitive case - is a substitute for the pronoun in 'his generosity.'

And it refers to their brothers, for the sake of their brothers among the hypocrites killed on the Day of Uhud or their brothers in kinship and in dwelling. And they sat, meaning they said, and they sat out of fighting: If our brothers had obeyed us in what we commanded them regarding sitting out and agreed with us in it, they would not have been killed as we were not killed. Say: 'Then avert death from yourselves if you are truthful.' Its meaning:

Say, "If you are truthful in that you have found a way to avert killing, which is by sitting out of fighting, then strive to avert death. This means that this aversion is not sufficient for you. For if you avert killing, which is one of the causes of death, you will not be able to avert the other causes that are widespread. It is inevitable that some of them will befall you." It has been narrated that seventy hypocrites died on the day they said this statement. If you say: 'They were truthful in that they averted killing from themselves.' [Mahmoud said: 'If you say they were truthful in that they averted... etc.'] Ahmad said: 'The mentioned question only applies to a Mu'tazili like them, for they believe that death can occur at the appointed time, and it can occur before it. They believe that if the killed had not been killed, he would have reached his written term that exceeds that. Therefore, a person, according to their claim, can avert the unexpected before the appointed time by avoiding the causes that lead to it. Hence, the mentioned question arises. As for the people of Sunnah, their belief is that every dead person dies at his appointed time. They say that those who go out to fight in battle could not avoid dying at that time, and that this time is their time in the knowledge of Allah, glorified and exalted is He, believing in His saying: (And when their term comes, they cannot delay it for an hour nor advance it). This is contrary to the hypocrites and those who agree with them from the Mu'tazilah in their saying: 'If they had obeyed us, they would not have died.' Indeed, they are in this belief imitating Nimrod in his saying: 'I give life and cause death,' for the fool thought that he could kill if he wished, and that would be causing death, and he could refrain from killing, and that would be giving life. He failed to realize that the one who refrained from killing was only alive to fulfill the term that Allah had written for him, and that the one who was killed died because he fulfilled his term at that hour. And Allah is the Guide." [This is regarding sitting out.] So what is the meaning of His saying: (If you are truthful)? I say: Its meaning is that the salvation from killing may be caused by sitting out of fighting or by something else, for the causes of salvation are many. And fighting may be the cause of a man's salvation; if he did not fight, he would be killed. So how do you know that the cause of your salvation is sitting out and that you are truthful in your statement? And what do you deny that the cause may be something else? Another point: If you are truthful in your saying: 'If they had obeyed us and sat out, they would not have been killed,' it means that if they had obeyed you and sat out, they would have been killed while sitting just as they were killed while fighting. And His saying (So avert death from yourselves) is mockery of them, meaning if you are men who defend against the causes of death, then avert all of its causes so that you do not die.