The elite are the nobles of Quraysh. They mean: they departed from Abu Talib's gathering after the Messenger of Allah, blessings and peace be upon him, had moved them with a strong response. They said to one another, 'Walk and be patient, for you have no way to repel the matter of Muhammad. This matter is certainly something that Allah, the Exalted, intends and decrees to carry out. What Allah intends to be cannot be turned back, and nothing will benefit you except patience. Or this matter is something from the calamities of time that is intended for us, and we cannot escape from it. Or your religion is something that is sought, meaning: it is desired to be taken from you, and you will be overcome by it.' And 'that' means 'what,' because those who departed from the gathering of discussion must speak and negotiate about what happened to them. Thus, their departure implied the meaning of speech. It is also possible that 'departure' refers to the rush in speech, and that they said: 'Walk,' meaning: increase your numbers and gather, from the term 'mashat' which refers to a woman who has many births. From it comes 'mashiya' (cattle), for optimism, as it was said to it: 'fashiya.' The Messenger of Allah, blessings and peace be upon him, said, 'Gather your herds' (reported by Ibn Hibban from the hadith of Jabir, may Allah be pleased with him, in the wording 'Kuffu,' and its origin is in Muslim). The meaning of 'and be patient on your idols' is: be patient in worshiping them and holding onto them until you do not abandon them. It has also been recited: 'And the elite among them departed saying, walk,' without 'that' implying the speech. And from Ibn Mas'ud: 'And the elite among them departed saying, be patient in the final religion,' in the religion of Jesus which is the last of the religions, because the Christians call it that while they are triune and not unified. Or in the religion of Quraysh, which we found our forefathers upon. Or that we have not heard of this occurring in the final religion, on the condition that it is placed in the final religion as a state of this and not connected to what we heard, as in the two previous cases. The meaning is: we have not heard from the People of the Book nor from the soothsayers that there will be a unification of Allah in the final religion. This is nothing but an invention, meaning: fabrication and falsehood.