ﲀ ﲁ ﲂ ﲃ ﲄ ﲅ ﲆ ﲇ ﲈ ﲉ ﲊ ﲋ ﲌ ﲍ ﲎ ﲏ ﲐ ﲑ ﲒ ﲓ ﲔ ﲕ ﲖ ﲗ ﲘ
But repentance is not [accepted] of those who [continue to] do evil deeds up until, when death comes to one of them, he says, "Indeed, I have repented now," or of those who die while they are disbelievers. For them We have prepared a painful punishment.
Tafsir
Verse range: 4:17-18
The word taubah means 'to turn back' and 'to turn to'. When a person feels sorry for his sin and turns back from it, he may be likened to a runaway slave who comes back to his master. This is his taubah. When the master accepts his repentance, he turns to him kindly and forgives him. In Arabic this is his taubah to his servant. In this verse Allah has stated these two aspects of taubah. He says, "I turn only to those servants of Mine, who, if they commit some un-intentional sin through ignorance, turn to Me for forgiveness as soon as they realize their folly. For such repentance, the door of My forgiveness is ever open. It is, however, not so for those who persist in sin throughout their lives without the least fear of Allah and offer repentance only when death confronts them". The Holy Prophet says that Allah accepts the repentance of a person only up to the time, when there appears no sign of death. It is obvious that after the time of test has expired, no chance is left for him to turn back from sin. Likewise, if a person is dying as a disbeliever and seeing with his own eyes the other world, contrary to his expectations, the question of his repentance does not arise at all.
