Tafsir of Hud 11:8

(Until a limited number [of days]) Meaning: A small group of days, because what can be encompassed by counting is small.

It is said that the meaning of "Ummah" (community/number) is a group of people; that is, "If We delay the punishment from them until a group [who follow one another] in which there is no believer." This is narrated from Ali ibn Isa. Al-Jubba’i stated that the meaning is "until a nation after these [people], whom We shall charge with duties, and they will disobey, so wisdom will necessitate their destruction and the establishment of the Resurrection." The Imami [Shi'a]—and they are a house of falsehood—narrated from Abu Ja'far and Abu Abdullah—may Allah be pleased with them—that what is meant by the "limited number" is the companions of the Mahdi at the end of time, and they are three hundred and some odd men, the same number as the people of Badr.

(They will surely say, "What detains it?") Meaning: What prevents it from coming? It is as if they desire it, but something is stopping it. They were saying this by way of impatience, which is a metaphor for mockery and denial; for if they had believed in it, they would not have been impatient for it. Their purpose was not to acknowledge its coming nor to inquire about what was detaining it, as what follows indicates:

(Verily, on the day it comes to them, it shall not be averted from them) That is, the punishment of the Hereafter or the worldly one. (It shall not be averted) Meaning: No one shall ever remove it, nor shall any defender turn it away from them; rather, it shall befall them.

The apparent meaning is that "yawm" (day) is in the accusative case as the predicate of "laysa" (is not), which is the subject of "masrufan" (averted). The majority of the Basran school used this as evidence for the permissibility of placing the predicate of "laysa" before it, just as it is permissible to place it before its subject without any significant disagreement, because placing the object [of the prepositional phrase] before the verb implies the precedence of the governing agent by priority; otherwise, it would necessitate the superiority of the branch over its root. The Kufans and al-Mubarrad held that it is not permissible, claiming that the verse is not a valid proof because the aforementioned rule is not consistent. Do you not see His, the Exalted, saying: (As for the orphan, do not oppress [him]), how the object of the verb is placed before it, despite the impossibility of [the verb] preceding it because the verb cannot follow "amma" (as for)? Furthermore, it has been reported from the Hijazis that they say, "Ma al-yawma Zaydun dhahiban" (Zayd is not going today), even though it is not permissible to place the predicate of "ma" before it by consensus. Moreover, the object [of the preposition] in the verse is an adverb, and the matter therein is based on leniency.

It has been said: it is linked to a deleted verb indicated by what follows; the estimation is "verily, the punishment will not be averted from them, or it will accompany them on the day it comes to them." Some among them made it linked to "yakhafun" (they fear) which is deleted; i.e., "Do they not fear on the day, etc.?" It is also said: it is a subject, not linked to "masrufan" nor to a deleted [verb], and it is indeclinable on the fatha because of its addition to the sentence. Similar to this is His, the Exalted, saying: (This is the day when the truthful will benefit) according to the reading of the fatha. You know that there is a disagreement among grammarians regarding the indeclinability of the adverb added to a sentence whose head is a present-tense verb, and that the apparent meaning is its link to "masrufan." Yes, the unsuitability of the verse for argumentation is beyond doubt. In al-Bahr, it says: "I have scrutinized many of the anthologies of the Arabs, and I have not found the predicate of 'laysa' being placed before it, nor its object [of the preposition] being placed before it, except for what the apparent meaning of this noble verse and the poet's words indicate: 'He refuses, and he does not increase except in obstinacy, and I was defiant in vice; I do not advance.'"

(And there shall encompass them) Meaning: It shall descend and surround them. Its root is haqqa, so it is like zalla and zala, and dhamma and dhama. The meaning is "it shall encompass them."

(what they used to mock) He expressed it in the past tense to signify the certainty of its occurrence. What is meant by the relative pronoun is the punishment; he expressed it as such to emphasize its gravity and to indicate the causality of what is mentioned in the relative clause—their mocking of it—for its descent and encompassing them. Mockery was placed in the position of impatience because it was, in fact, mockery.