Tafsir of Hud 11:28

{أرءيتم} (Have you considered): Inform me. {إن كنت على بينة} (If I am upon a clear proof): Upon a demonstration. {من ربى} (From my Lord): And a witness from Him that testifies to the truth of my claim.

{قال ياقوم أرأيتم إن}: By providing the proof, he means that the proof itself is the mercy. It is also possible that by "proof" he means the miracle, and by "mercy" he means prophethood.

If you ask: The phrase {فعميت} (it was made blind/hidden) is clear according to the first interpretation, but what is its basis according to the second? Should it not be fa-ʿamiyatā (dual)? I reply: The interpretation is to assume the word "blinded" applies to the proof, and the omission is for the sake of brevity, having mentioned it once. The meaning of ʿamiyat is "it was hidden." It is also recited as fuʿmiyat (passive), meaning "it was hidden." In the reading of Ubayy, it is fa-ʿammāhā ʿalaykum (He made it blind to you).

If you ask: What is the reality of this? I reply: Its reality is that just as the argument was made a source of insight and illumination, it was also made "blind," because a blind person neither finds guidance nor guides others. Thus, the meaning of fa-ʿamiyat ʿalaykum al-bayyinah is that it failed to guide you, just as if a guide were blinded for a traveler in the desert, they would remain without direction.

If you ask: What is the meaning of Ubayy’s reading? I reply: It means they were determined to turn away from it, so God left them to their determination, and that abandonment was a "blinding" from Him. The evidence for this is His saying: {أنلزمكموها وأنتم لها كارهون} (Shall we force it upon you while you are averse to it?). Meaning: Shall we compel you to accept it and force you to be guided by it while you hate it and do not choose it? Is there not "no compulsion in religion"? Both object pronouns are attached here. It is permissible for the second to be detached, as in anulzimukum iyyāhā. Similar to this is {fasayakfīkahumu Allāh} (God will suffice you against them), though fasayakfīka iyyāhum is also permissible. It is reported from Abu ‘Amr that he silenced the mīm (in kum), but the correct view is that the vowel was merely a light, fleeting sound, which the narrator mistook for silence. Explicit silence (sukun) is considered a grammatical error by al-Khalil, Sibawayh, and the masters of the Basran school, because inflectional vowels cannot be dropped except in the necessity of poetry.

The pronoun in his saying {لا أسئلكم عليه} (I ask you no reward for it) refers back to his statement: {إنى لكم نذير مبين * أن لا تعبدوا إلا الله} (I am to you a clear warner, that you worship none but Allah). It is also recited as wa-mā anā bi-ṭāridi alladhīna āmanū (with tanwin) according to the original grammar.

If you ask: What is the meaning of {أنهم ملاقوا ربهم} (that they will meet their Lord)? I reply: It means they will meet God, and He will punish those who drove them away. Or, they will meet Him, and He will reward them for the sincere, firm faith in their hearts—which is what I have perceived in them, and I know nothing else of them. Or, it refers to the opposite of what you accuse them of, namely, that their faith is built on superficial judgment without reflection. It is not my duty to split open their hearts and investigate their secrets just to drive them away, if the matter were as you claim. Similar to this is: {ولا تطرد الذين يدعون ربهم} (And do not drive away those who call upon their Lord). Or, it means they are believers in meeting their Lord, certain of it, and know they will inevitably meet Him.

{تجهلون} (You are ignorant): You act foolishly toward the believers and call them the lowest of people. From the saying: "Let no one act foolishly against us." Or, you are ignorant of meeting your Lord, or you are ignorant that they are better than you.

{من ينصرنى من الله} (Who would help me against Allah): Who would protect me from His vengeance? {إن طردتهم} (If I drove them away): They were asking him to drive them away so they could believe in him, out of arrogance at being on equal footing with them.

{أعلم الغيب} (Do I know the unseen?): This is conjoined to {عندي خزائن الله} (I have the treasures of Allah). Meaning: I do not say I have the treasures of Allah, nor do I say I know the unseen. The meaning is: I do not claim to have the treasures of Allah so that I might claim superiority over you in wealth, leading you to deny my merit by saying {وما نرى لكم علينا من فضل} (We do not see you have any merit over us). Nor do I claim knowledge of the unseen so that you might accuse me of lying and fabrication, or so that I might peer into the souls of my followers and the secrets of their hearts.

{ولا أقول إنى ملك} (Nor do I say I am an angel): So that you might say, "You are but a human like us." Nor do I judge those whom you have deemed lowly among the believers due to their poverty, saying that God will not give them good in this world or the Hereafter because they are insignificant to Him—as you say, in order to assist you and yield to your desires.

{إنى إذا لمن الظالمين} (Indeed, I would then be among the wrongdoers): If I were to say any of that. Al-izdirā’ (disdain) is a form derived from zara’a ʿalayhi when one finds fault with someone. Azrā bihi means to belittle him. It is said: "His eye disdained him," meaning he looked down upon him.