Al-Qamar: (4) "And there has certainly come to them of..."

"And there has certainly come to them" (in the Quran) "of the tidings," meaning the reports of past generations, or the reports of the Hereafter. The prepositional phrase "of the tidings" occupies the position of a circumstantial qualifier (hal) for what is in His saying, the Mighty and Majestic: "wherein is deterrence."

It was placed forward out of regard for the verse ending (the fasila) and as an enticement towards it. The "of" (min) is for partition (tab'id) or for explication (tabyin), based on the preferred view regarding the permissibility of placing it before the thing being explicated. Al-Radi said: The placing of the explanatory "of" before the indefinite [antecedent] is only permissible in expressions like "I have of wealth what suffices," because it is originally an adjective for an elliptical [noun], meaning: "something of wealth." The mentioned [noun] is an explicative apposition ('atf bayan) for the elliptical antecedent preceding it, so that explanation occurs after the indefiniteness.

Meaning: By Allah, there has certainly come to them—being of the tidings—that which contains for them a deterrent and a prevention from the vile acts they are engaged in, or a place of deterrence and prevention; and these are the tidings of punishment or the tidings of the threat. The root of muzdajar is from tajar (with a ta instead of a dal), and the ta of the ifti'al form is changed into a dal when [the root] contains a dal, a dhal, or a za (for phonetic harmony). It was also recited as muzzajar, by changing it into a za and assimilating the za into it. Zayd ibn Ali recited it as muzjir, an active participle from azjara, meaning: "it became a deterrent," like a'shaba (meaning: it became full of herbage).