Tafsir of Fatir 35:22

{And the living and the dead are not equal}: This is another allegory for the believers who entered the religion after the mission [of the Prophet], and the disbelievers who persisted and were arrogant. The definition [of the noun] here, as al-Tayyibi said, is for the specification of a known group (li-al-‘ahd). It has also been said that it refers to the scholars and the ignorant.

Al-Tha‘alibi made the blind and the seeing [as] two examples for these [groups], but that is not firmly grounded. {Indeed, Allah causes whom He wills to hear}: That is, He makes them hear and causes them to perceive sounds. Al-Khafaji and others said: Perhaps the verse implies that the intended meaning is causing those whom He wills to hear with the hearing of contemplation and acceptance of His verses—Mighty and Majestic is He.

{And you are not one who can make hear those who are in the graves}: This is an amplification of the allegory comparing those who persist in disbelief to the dead, and an exaggeration in despairing—peace and blessings be upon him—of their belief. The [prefix] ba is added for emphasis; that is, "You are not a hearer." The hearing intended here is the same as intended in the preceding [verse]. Nor is the intended common [literal] hearing—as mentioned in the hadith of the Qalib (the pit)—repugnant here, because the intent is the negation of hearing by way of normal habit, and what is in the hadith is in the manner of: {And you threw not when you threw, but it was Allah who threw}. Some have leaned toward this, and the discussion on that has already passed, so do not be heedless.

How subtle is the organization of these allegories! He likened the believer and the disbeliever first to the two seas, and preferred the salt-water sea [over the disbeliever] only to illustrate the disbeliever's lack of benefit. Then, He likened them to the blind and the seeing, followed by the darknesses and the light, and the shade and the heat. He did not suffice with the loss of the light of vision, but added to it the loss of the external light that sustains it, and linked to that the result of that blindness and loss. Thus, there is an escalation from the first analogy to this one, then to the living and the dead as a second escalation, and He followed it with His saying—the Almighty—{And you are not one who can make hear those who are in the graves}.

Al-Tayyibi mentioned that the omission of the emphatic la in the second [analogy] is because it acts as a preamble to the saying of the Almighty, {And the living and the dead are not equal}. For this reason, He repeated {and not equal}. As for its mention in the two allegories that follow, it is because they are intended in themselves, since they are analogies for Truth and Falsehood and the reward and punishment to which they lead, rather than for the believer and the disbeliever as in the others. The particle is considered added for the purpose of emphasizing the negation, because it is not intended that darknesses in themselves are not equal—rather, they differ, for one darkness may be more intense than another, and the same is said for what follows—but rather, the intent is that darknesses are not equal to light, shade is not equal to heat, and the living are not equal to the dead.

Ibn ‘Atiyyah claimed that the entry of la [in the later examples] is based on the intention of repetition, as if one said: "And not the darknesses and the light, and not the light and the darknesses," and so on. Thus, the mention of the first terms suffices for the second, and the mentioned part of the speech indicates the omitted part. However, the saying that it is added for the emphasis of the negation dispenses with considering this ellipsis, which serves no purpose.

The Imam said: la was repeated where it was repeated to emphasize the contradiction. Darknesses contradict and oppose light, and shade and heat are likewise, because the intent of "shade" is the absence of heat and cold. This is contrary to the "blind" and "seeing," for a single person may be seeing, then blindness befalls him, so there is no contradiction except in terms of the attribute. As for the living and the dead, even though they are like the blind and the seeing in that the same body may be living then death befalls it, the contradiction between the living and the dead is more complete than between the blind and the seeing; for they may share in the perception of things, whereas that is not the case for the living and the dead. How could they [be similar], when the dead is opposed to the living in essence, according to what has been clarified in divine wisdom? It has also been said that it was not repeated [in certain places] because the addressee at the beginning of the discourse does not fail to understand the intent. And it has been said that it was repeated in all but the last [analogy] because, had one said: "The blind and the seeing are not equal, and neither are darknesses and light," one might imagine the negation of equality between the totality of the blind/seeing and the totality of the darknesses/light. [It is included] in the last out of concern [for the structure], and the entry of la upon the opposites is to recall the negation of equality.

He placed the "blind" before the "seeing," even though the "seeing" is more noble, because it is an indication of the disbeliever, who existed before the mission and the call to faith. For a similar reason, He placed "darknesses" before "light," for Falsehood existed, then Truth suppressed it with His mission—peace and blessings be upon him. He did not place "heat" before "shade" in order to follow the pattern of the preceding [analogies] of placing the less noble first; rather, He placed "shade" first in consideration of its affinity with blindness and darkness in one aspect, or because of the precedence of mercy, along with the consideration of the verse ending (fasila).

He placed the "living" before the "dead" and did not reverse the matter, so as to agree with the first two in placing the less noble first, because the "living" is an indication of the believers after the call, and the "dead" is an indication of those who persist in disbelief thereafter. This is why it was said afterward: {Indeed, Allah causes whom He wills to hear}, etc., and due to the presence of the persistent [disbelievers] with the quality of persistence after the existence of the believers. It is said that He placed what He placed in all but the last because it is non-existence, and it has the rank of precedence. In the last [analogy], it is because what is meant by "the dead" are those who lack life after having been characterized by it—as suggested by the following: {And you are not one who can make hear those who are in the graves}. Thus, life, despite being an existential quality, also has the rank of precedence. It is also said that placing the less noble before the more noble—with the understanding that it is less noble—is to indicate that the act of placing [in text] is merely formal and does not impair the nobility of the more noble.

Fire is topped by smoke, and dust may top the turbans of knights. He pluralized "darknesses" while using the singular for "light" because of the multiplicity of the types of falsehood and the oneness of Truth. It is also said [this is] because darkness may be multiple and exist in places with light interspersed between them, while light in this world, even if it is multiple, is unified behind the place of its multiplicity. He pluralized "living" and "dead" in accordance with their literal meaning because the subjects of the analogy are multiple. He did not pluralize "blind" and "seeing" for that reason, because the intent is the generic category, and the singular is more manifest in that—even though in al-busara' (the seeing) there is a failure to observe the verse ending, which is [less pleasing] to refined taste than al-basir (the seeing). So contemplate all of this, and Allah—the Exalted—knows best the secrets of His Book, and He is the Knowing, the Aware.