Tafsir of Ash-Shu`ara' 26:197

The hamza is for confirmation (taqrir) or for denial and negation (inkar wa-nafi), and the waw is for conjunction to a suppressed clause necessitated by the context; as if it were said: "Have they neglected that, and has there not been for them a sign?"

It is a sign indicating that it is a revelation from the Lord of the Worlds and that it is in the scriptures of the former peoples. "For them" (lahum) is related to the verb of being (kawn), placed before its noun, which is His saying: {that the scholars of the Children of Israel know it}. This is due to what has passed—that the Children of Israel recognized the Quran by its attributes mentioned in their books.

Qatadah stated that the pronoun [in "know it"] refers to the Prophet, peace and blessings be upon him. It is also said that "knowledge" (al-'ilm) is in its famous sense, and the pronoun refers to the previous ruling in His saying: {And indeed, it is the revelation of the Lord of the Worlds. The Trustworthy Spirit has brought it down upon your heart}, etc. This view has remoteness, as is not hidden.

Al-Tha'labi mentioned on the authority of Ibn Abbas that the people of Mecca sent to the rabbis of Yathrib to ask them about the Prophet, and they said: "This is his time," and they mentioned his attributes while becoming confused regarding the affair of Muhammad, may Allah bless him and grant him peace. Thus, this verse was revealed regarding that, which is evident in the pronoun referring to him, peace and blessings be upon him. This is supported by the fact that the surah is Meccan.

Muqatil said: "It is Medinan," and that the "scholars of the Children of Israel" are 'Abdullah ibn Salam and his likes, as is reported from Ibn Abbas and Mujahid; this is because a group of them accepted Islam and pointed to passages in the Torah and the Gospel in which the Messenger, peace and blessings be upon him, is mentioned.

It is also said: It means their scholars, those who accepted Islam and those who did not. It is also said: It means their prophets, for they alerted [people] to that; but this is contrary to the apparent meaning. Perhaps the most apparent of the opinions is that what is meant are his contemporaries, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, from the scholars of the two Books, both those who believed and those who did not.

Ibn Amir and al-Jahdari read takun (in the feminine), and ayah in the nominative case (raf'), making it the noun of takun, and an ya'lamahu its predicate. This is weakened by the fact that it involves predicating a definite noun by an indefinite one. This is not dispelled by the [alternative] claim that the indefinite [noun] is specific, based on one of the possibilities: that "for them" relates to a suppressed predicate, that "an ya'lamahu" is a substitute for the noun or a predicate of a suppressed subject, or that the noun is the "pronoun of the story" (damir al-qissa), and "for them a sign" is a nominal sentence acting as the predicate of takun, and "an ya'lamahu" is a substitute or a predicate of a suppressed subject. Or that the noun is the pronoun of the story, and "sign" is the predicate of "an ya'lamahu," and the sentence is the predicate of takun. Or that takun is complete (tamma), and "sign" is the agent (fa'il), and "an ya'lamahu" is a substitute or a predicate for a suppressed [noun], and "for them" is either an adverbial state or related to takun.

Ibn Abbas read takun (in the feminine) and ayah in the accusative case (nasb), similar to the reading of those who read thumma lam takun fitnatuhum (in the feminine) with the accusative, except that they said [the word] illa... and like the saying of Labid describing the wild ass and the she-ass: "So he passed, and he put her in front, and it was a habit of his whenever she swerved, [to place] her footsteps." This is either due to the feminization of the noun because of the feminization of the predicate, or by interpreting an ya'lamahu as a definite noun, or interpreting an qalu as "the statement," or interpreting "the footsteps" as "the forerunner." The claim of acquiring feminine gender from the genitive (mudaf ilayhi) is of no substance due to the absence of its famous condition.

Al-Jahdari read ta'lamahu (in the feminine), meaning the group of scholars of the Children of Israel. It was written in the codex 'ulama'u with a waw between the mim and the alif. The reason for this is that it follows the dialect of those who incline the alif of 'ulama' toward the waw, just as they wrote al-salat, al-zakat, and al-hayat with a waw according to that dialect.