Tafsir of At-Taghabun 64:2

This is an explanation of some of His general omnipotence. The meaning is: He is the One who brought you into existence as He willed.

As for His saying, "Yet some of you are disbelievers, and some of you are believers": it means that some of you are disbelievers in Him, the Almighty, and some are believers in Him, the Majestic and Exalted. Or, some among you are disbelievers in Him, the Glorified, and some among you are believers in Him, the Exalted. This is a detailed explanation of the summary contained in "He created you," because the state of some or a portion of them being disbelievers and some or a portion being believers is intended by that act. Thus, the fa (Yet/So) is like the fa in His saying: "And Allah created every living creature from water; so some of them move on their bellies" (24:45), etc. Consequently, disbelief and faith are included within the scope of creation.

This is supported by authentic reports, such as the narration of Bukhari, Muslim, Tirmidhi, and Abu Dawud from Ibn Mas'ud, who said: The Messenger of Allah (may Allah bless him and grant him peace)—the truthful, the confirmed—told us: "The creation of one of you is gathered in his mother’s womb for forty days as a drop, then he becomes a clot like that, then a lump like that. Then Allah sends to him an angel with four commands: to write his provision, his lifespan, his deeds, and whether he is wretched or blessed; then the soul is blown into him..." (the rest of the hadith).

'Abd bin Humayd, Ibn al-Mundhir, Ibn Abi Hatim, and Ibn Mardawayh reported from Abu Dharr, who said: The Messenger of Allah (may Allah bless him and grant him peace) said: "When the fetus stays in the womb for forty nights, the angel of the souls comes to him, and he ascends with him to the Lord. He says: 'O Lord, male or female?' And Allah decrees what He decrees. He says: 'Wretched or blessed?' And he writes what he will encounter."

Some have chosen the meaning: He is the One who created you in a distinct, perfect manner, encompassing all the foundations of perfection, both cognitive and practical. Yet, despite this, some of you choose disbelief and earn it, contrary to what your creation demands, while some of you choose faith and earn it as your creation requires. It was incumbent upon all of you to choose faith and be grateful for the blessing of creation, existence, and all other blessings derived from them. You did not do that, despite your full capacity to do so; rather, you diverged into factions and split into groups.

This is the view held by al-Zamakhshari, although he interpreted "disbeliever" as "the one who brings about disbelief and performs it," and "believer" as "the one who brings about faith and performs it." This is because it aligns with his school of thought—that the servant is the creator of his own actions—and that the verse serves to highlight their failure to fulfill what is required by the favor bestowed upon them regarding the fundamental blessing, which is creation and existence. He maintained that the subsequent verses serve as a warning against disbelief and a denunciation of disobeying the Creator and failing to thank Him for His blessings. He then said: "How ignorant is he who conflates disbelief with creation and makes it part of it, while creation is the greatest blessing from Allah to His servants, and disbelief is the greatest ingratitude from the servants to their Lord."

Al-Tayyibi interpreted the fa here as denoting sequence and consequence by way of metaphor, like the lam in His saying: "So the family of Pharaoh picked him up, that he might become an enemy and a cause of grief for them" (28:8). It is like the fa in His saying: "And We placed in his descendants prophethood and the Book; so some of them are guided, but many of them are defiantly disobedient" (57:26). He did not treat it as a detail, as others have claimed. He chose the aforementioned meaning for the verse, supporting it with authentic hadiths and the context, arguing that the verses were all revealed to manifest the greatness of Allah in His kingdom and dominion, His absolute authority over both, the comprehensiveness of His knowledge, and His origination of all created things—both their essences and their accidents.

His astute student, the author of al-Kashf, agreed with him in choosing this. He challenged al-Zamakhshari’s statement, "How ignorant is he...," by saying that it contains what has been addressed repeatedly, as if he meant the contradiction of the texts regarding disbelief not being created like other things. Furthermore, the creation of disbelief is also among the great blessings; were it not for its creation and the manifestation of the harms within it, the amount of blessing in faith and its benefits would not be known. Moreover, it being "disbelief" is due to it being associated with the servant, and from that aspect comes the reprehensibility, not from the fact that Allah created it, as has been substantiated in its place. He then said: "From this, it becomes clear that his [al-Zamakhshari’s] forced interpretation of His saying, 'some of you,' to remove it from the category of 'detailing the summary' in 'He created you' is a distortion of the Book of Allah."

To me, the "detailing" is favored by the wording of the verse: "disbeliever and believer" rather than "the one who disbelieves and the one who believes." True, the exclusion of disbelief and faith from creation is more consistent with His saying: "The innate nature (fitrah) of Allah upon which He has created [all] people" (30:30), and the Prophet's saying: "Every newborn is born upon the fitrah."

In fairness, the verse is capable of both meanings: the meaning mentioned first and the one chosen by some others. The context allows for interpretation in accordance with both, and it is not a decisive text for either of the two things you have heard. Some have said that the verses were revealed to state the prerequisites for promise and warning—namely, absolute power and knowledge encompassing both realms of existence—and His saying: "And Allah is Seeing of what you do."

That is: He will recompense you in a manner appropriate to that. This does not contradict the creation of disbelief and faith, for they are things earned by the servant. Allah’s creating them does not negate them being earned by the servant, as discussed in the explanation of His saying: "And Allah created you and that which you do" (37:96). However, most hadiths support the first meaning. I seem to perceive that you prefer the second, as the context being a reproach for disbelief is more apparent and more fitting for it.

From 'Ata' bin Abi Rabah: "Some of you are disbelievers" (in Allah, the Almighty), "and some of you are believers" (in Allah, the Almighty). It is said: "Some of you are disbelievers" (in creation, and these are the materialists), "and some of you are believers" (in Him). From al-Hasan: there is an ellipsis in the speech, and the estimation is "and some of you are sinners." I do not see this as correct; it seems to be from the lies of the Mu'tazilah against him. The sentence, according to what some scholars have supported, is a conjunction to the relative clause, and it is not harmed by the lack of a returning pronoun, because the conjunction with fa is satisfied by the presence of a pronoun in one of the two clauses, as they have established in cases like, "The fly which flies and Zayd gets angry at [it]." Or it may be said: it contains an interpretive link, meaning "some of you were destined to disbelieve and some of you were destined to believe," or "some of you are disbelievers in Him and some of you are believers in Him," with the omission being estimated gradually. It is also permissible that the conjunction is to the sentence, "He is the One who created you."