Tafsir of Al-Qalam 68:32

Meaning: He shall grant us a substitute for it, through the blessing of repentance and the confession of sin.

Meaning: Better than that [former] garden.

Exclusively toward Him, may He be glorified, and not toward any other.

Meaning: Hoping for pardon and seeking goodness. The preposition ‘ila’ (to/toward) is used either to denote the culmination of desire or because the word ‘raghibun’ implies the meaning of returning.

It has been narrated from Mujahid that they repented, and thus they were granted a substitute better than it. It is also narrated that they made a covenant among themselves and said, "If Allah, the Exalted, replaces it for us with something better, we shall surely act as our father did [i.e., by being charitable]." They then supplicated to Allah, the Mighty and Majestic, and humbled themselves before Him, the Glorified. That very night, Allah, the Exalted, replaced it for them with something better than it.

Ibn Mas‘ud said: "It has reached me that the people supplicated to Allah, the Exalted, and were sincere; and Allah, the Exalted, knew the truthfulness in them, so He replaced their garden with one called al-Hayawan, in which there were grapes, a single cluster of which would be carried by a mule."

Abu Khalid al-Yamani said: "I saw that garden, and every cluster of its grapes was like a standing black man."

Abu Hayyan favored the view that they were believers who had committed a sin and subsequently repented. It is narrated from some that they were People of the Book. Al-Tustari stated that the majority of scholars maintain that they repented and were sincere.

Al-Hasan [al-Basri] refrained from judging their faith, saying: "I do not know if their statement, 'Indeed, we are toward our Lord desirous,' was a [true] profession of faith, or if it was merely of the type uttered by polytheists when distress befalls them."

Qatadah was asked about them: "Were they from the people of Paradise or the people of the Fire?" He replied to the questioner: "You have burdened me with toil."

Nafi‘ and Abu ‘Amr read yubaddilana (replace for us) with the shaddah (emphasis).