Tafsir of Al-An'am 6:158

(Do they wait): This is a resumption of the discourse, initiated to demonstrate that they are incapable of believing even after the aforementioned clear proofs and guidance have been sent down. It also signals that there are signs before which faith is of no benefit. It is an exaggeration in conveyance and warning, and a removal of excuses and pretexts.

As for "هل" (hal), it is used for interrogative negation. Ar-Rida denied that it comes for this purpose, arguing that it is for confirmation in the affirmative, but the majority maintain the first [view]. The pronoun [in "wait"] refers to the disbelievers of Mecca. Al-Jubba'i claimed it refers to the Prophet ﷺ and his companions (may Allah be pleased with them)—meaning, what do they wait for?

(Except that the angels should come to them): To seize their souls.

(Or your Lord should come): On the Day of Resurrection, in shadows of clouds, just as He has informed and in the manner He intended. This interpretation was adopted by Ibn Mas'ud, Qatadah, and Muqatil. It has been said: the coming of the angels refers to the sending down of torment and destruction upon them. From al-Hasan, it is the coming of the Lord in the sense of the arrival of His command for torment. From Ibn Abbas, the meaning is that the command of your Lord will come upon them with execution. It has also been said: the meaning is that all His signs will come—that is, the signs of the Resurrection and total destruction, according to His saying, glory be to Him: (Or some of the signs of your Lord should come).

You know that the famous position of the Salaf is not to interpret such matters by implying an omitted word or the like, but rather to consign the intended meaning to the All-Subtle, All-Aware, while being certain that the literal (apparent) meaning is not intended. Some among them leave it upon the apparent meaning, yet they claim that the "coming" attributed to Him is not the coming that characterizes contingent beings. The essence of this is that they affirm the literal wording while denying the implications, claiming those are implications [only] in the witnessed realm—and how far is the dust from the Lord of Lords!

Some investigators permitted taking the speech on its literal meaning as understood by people, with the intent being to narrate the doctrine and belief of the disbelievers, and the Imam (ar-Razi) relied upon this, though it is far-fetched or invalid.

The "signs" (al-ayat) according to some are the portents of the Hour, which, as gathered from the reports, are many. It is authentically established through the paths of Hudhayfah ibn Asid who said: The Messenger of Allah ﷺ looked down upon us from an upper room while we were discussing. He said: "What are you discussing?" We said: "We are discussing the Hour." He said: "It will not arrive until you see ten signs before it: the smoke, the Dajjal, 'Isa ibn Maryam, Gog and Magog, the Beast, the rising of the sun from its west, and three eclipses: an eclipse in the East, an eclipse in the West, and an eclipse in the Arabian Peninsula; and the last of that is a fire that emerges from the depths of Aden or Yemen, driving the people to the place of gathering, descending with them when they descend and resting with them when they rest."

According to some, the "some signs" mentioned in His saying, (the day when some of the signs of your Lord come, a soul's faith will not benefit it if it had not believed before), refers to: the Dajjal, the Beast, and the rising of the sun from its west. Muslim, Ahmad, at-Tirmidhi, and others narrated from Abu Hurayrah in a marfu' (attributed) report what is explicit in this regard. This was complicated by the fact that the emergence of 'Isa (peace be upon him) occurs after the Dajjal—may the curse be upon him—and he (peace be upon him) calls people to faith and accepts it from them, and in his time there is much worldly and otherworldly good. Answers have been given to this that are devoid of scrutiny. The truth is that the "some" after which faith is of no benefit refers to the rising of the sun from its west.

For the two Shaykhs (al-Bukhari and Muslim) narrated: "The Hour will not arrive until the sun rises from its west; so when it rises and the people see it, they will all believe, but that is the time when 'a soul's faith will not benefit it'." Then he read the verse. Indeed, this specification has been narrated from him ﷺ in more than one authentic report, and the elite among the exegetical scholars have gone to this. The reports whose outward meanings contradict this are not contradictory upon investigation, as is not hidden from the contemplative mind.

The reason for the lack of benefit of faith at that time is that when the change in the celestial world is witnessed, necessary knowledge is attained, and faith in the unseen—which is the [requirement of] obligation—is removed. Thus, faith at that moment is like faith at the final death-rattle (al-ghargharah). The requirements of the reports on this subject indicate that faith is never accepted after that. However, the apparent view, as stated in az-Zawajir, is the acceptance of what occurs after that without negligence, such as one who becomes insane and then recovers, or one who accepts Islam following his parents.

Al-Bulqini mentioned that if the situation drags on after the sun rises from the west and a long time passes until the [sight of the] sign is forgotten, faith is accepted due to the vanishing of the compelling sign, and this has a sound perspective. The statement of al-'Iraqi that it is apparent that the time would not be long enough to be forgotten is not sound, according to what al-Qurtubi narrated in his Tadhkirah from Ibn 'Umar (may Allah be pleased with them both) from the Prophet ﷺ, and it was transmitted by the memorizer (al-Hafiz) Ibn Hajar in Sharh al-Bukhari, that people remain for one hundred and twenty years after the sun rises from the west.

The discourse on the mechanism of its rising from the west is detailed in the books of Hadith. In Suq al-'Arus by Ibn al-Jawzi, it states that the sun rises from the west for three days and nights, then it is said to it: "Return from your rising point." The famous view is that it rises one day from the west, travels to the meridian line, then returns to the west, and rises thereafter from the east as was its habit before. The report of 'Abd Allah ibn Abi Awfa is explicit in this, and all of it is possible, and Allah, glory be to Him, is capable of all things.

Al-Bukhari narrated in his Tarikh, and Abu ash-Shaykh and Ibn 'Asakir in the manner of this, from Ka'b (may Allah be pleased with him) that he said: "When Allah the Almighty wants to raise the sun from its west, He rotates it at the pole, making its east its west and its west its east." The astronomers and those who agree with them claim that the rising of the sun from the west is impossible, saying: "The sun and other celestial bodies are simple substances; their requirements do not vary by direction or movement, and no change from their current state can affect them." They have built this upon [something like] the edge of a crumbling cliff.

Al-Kirmani said: "Even if we concede their rules, there is no impossibility in this, for they allow the possibility of the congruence of the zodiac belt (known as the sphere of the fixed stars) with the equator (the belt of the greatest sphere, known as the Atlas sphere), such that the east becomes west and the west becomes east." This is the end [of his statement], but there is scrutiny in it which is known after explaining the mechanism of congruence and its consequences.

[Skipping the detailed technical astronomical discussion of the spheres and poles...]

Waiting in the verse is interpreted as a metaphor based on likening the state of these disbelievers—in their persistence in disbelief and continuing in stubbornness until those terrible things arrive, which they must surely believe in upon witnessing—to the state of those who are waiting for them. This is what the transmitted interpretation necessitates, and one should not deviate from the interpretation after the attribution of some of it to the Messenger of Allah ﷺ and some to his companions (may Allah be pleased with them) has been established. There is nothing in the noble structure of the verse that refuses this, nor does the context support anything else.

It was said: The meaning of the coming of the angels and the coming of the Lord, glory be to Him, is what they demanded by saying: (Why are the angels not sent down to us, or do we not see our Lord?) and by His saying, (or you bring Allah and the angels before us); and by the coming of some signs other than those mentioned, as they demanded by saying: (or you make the sky fall upon us in pieces, as you have claimed), and the like of the great signs upon which they conditioned their faith.

It is permissible to carry the meaning of "some signs" in His saying, (the day when some of the signs of your Lord come), to include their demands and other great calamities that strip away the choice upon which the orbit of obligation turns. This is a discourse that is not trivial in itself, but if the Hadith is authentic, then it is my doctrine. The expression "some" (al-ba'd) is for intimidation and grandiosity, just as the attribution of the signs to the name "Lord" (ar-Rabb) signals the absolute ownership of these signs, and its attribution to the pronoun of the Prophet ﷺ is for honor.

The indefinite "a soul" (nafsan) is for generalization. The clause "if it had not believed before" is in the position of the accusative as an adjective for "a soul," separated from it by the subject, for it contains a pronoun of the described; there is no harm in this because it is not foreign to it, as they share the same agent. It is permissible that it is a resumption. "The day" (yawm) is in the accusative governed by "will not benefit," and the prevention of the action of what is after "la" (no) upon what is before it only applies when it is an answer to an oath.

Hamzah and al-Kisa'i read "ya'tiyahum" (with a ya') because the feminine gender of the angels is not true [feminine]. It was read "yawmun" with a nominative (damma) as an initial, and the predicate is the [following] sentence, with the object of reference omitted—meaning, "it will not benefit in it." Abu al-'Aliyah and Ibn Sirin read "la tanfa'u" with a ta', and Ibn Jinni explained it as being from the category of "some of his fingers were cut," for the annexed noun has acquired femininity from the noun to which it is annexed because it is similar to that which can be dispensed with. Abu Hayyan said: The femininity is for interpreting "faith" as "creed and knowledge," like "my book came to me (ja'at-hu kitabi) and he scorned it," meaning the scroll.

And His saying, glory be to Him: (or earned in its faith some good), is coordinated with "believed." The speech is interpreted as negating the disjunction, which necessitates the generalization implied by its wording. The condition of the lack of benefit is the absence of both things: the prior faith and the good earned within it. By its implication, the requirement for benefit is the realization of one of the two, by way of preventing total exclusion, not a true disjunction. The meaning is that faith at that time does not benefit a soul that has not previously issued from it either pure faith or good earned within that faith. Thus, the good is realized by whichever of the two, as declared by the noble texts of verses and authentic Hadith.

The Mu'tazilah say that the disjunction between the two negations is intended to negate the generalization, not to generalize the negation. The meaning is that faith at that time does not benefit a soul that has not preceded it with faith, or [a soul that] has preceded it with faith but has not earned good in it. This is explicit in their doctrine that faith devoid of action is not considered and does not benefit its possessor. They did not carry this to the generalization of negation as they established in His saying, (and do not obey among them a sinner or a disbeliever), because that is where no circumstantial or textual evidence exists to the contrary, whereas here evidence has been established to the contrary. If the generalization of negation were considered, mentioning the condition of the lack of benefit by being devoid of earning good in faith would be rendered futile, for if faith is negated before that day, then the earning of good within it is negated definitively. Furthermore, that which necessitates eternity in the Fire is the lack of faith, without the lack of earning good having any role in that at all; thus, its mention in the context of clarifying what necessitates eternity would be idle speech.

The Shaykh al-Islam answered this by saying that it is based on the illusion that the intended meaning of describing the soul with the two mentioned negatives is merely to explain that they both necessitate eternity in the Fire and that the faith occurring [at that time] does not benefit in saving it from it. This is not the case; otherwise, it would have sufficed to say: "the faith occurring in that day does not benefit a soul." Rather, the primary intended meaning of describing it with those two negatives while mentioning the lack of benefit of the occurring faith is to verify that the cause of benefit is one of the two possessions—the prior faith or the good earned within it—for the mentioned method and the encouragement to attain them within the warning against abandoning them. There is no way to say: "Just as the lack of the first is independent in necessitating eternity in the Fire, thus rendering the mention of the lack of the second idle, so too is the existence [of the first] independent in necessitating salvation, making the mention of the second idle." This is an analogy with a difference; for how could it be otherwise, when eternity in the Fire is a matter in which the multiplicity of causes cannot be conceived? As for salvation from it and entry into Paradise, it has levels, some of which are dependent upon faith itself, and others upon its branches, differing in quantity and quality.

He did not limit it to the coming of that which necessitates the origin of benefit—which is the prior faith—while it is the one contrasted with that which does not necessitate it at all—which is the occurring faith. Rather, he combined with it that which necessitates additional benefit, as guidance to seek the higher, an alert to the sufficiency of the lower, and to dash the empty greeds of the disbelievers regarding the good deeds they performed while in disbelief, which are of the category of noble traits. It shows that just as occurring faith does not benefit them alone, it does not benefit them with the addition of their prior and subsequent deeds. Then he said: "You may say: the intended meaning of describing the soul with the mentioned negatives is to expose the state of the disbelievers in their rebellion and their negligence in each of the two matters required of them, even if the obligation of one is dependent on the other, as in His saying, glory be to Him: (So he neither believed, nor prayed, but denied and turned away), in order to record against them the completion of their tyranny and to signal the multiplication of their punishment, because it is established that the disbelievers are addressed by the branches of law in terms of accountability, as indicated by His saying, (Woe to the polytheists, who do not give the zakah)."

[More technical discussions follow...]

(Say): To them, after clarifying the reality of the situation in the manner of a threat: (Wait), for what you are waiting for from the arrival of one of these matters. (We are waiting), for that, and then we will succeed and you will perish. It is said: In this is support that the meaning of what they are waiting for is the arrival of the angels of torment or the arrival of His command for it, and an implicit promise to the Messenger of Allah ﷺ and the believers of His support against what will afflict the disbelievers of torment. Perhaps that is what they witnessed on the day of Badr.