Tafsir of Al-Kahf 18:16

{And when you have withdrawn from them and that which they worship except Allah}

This is an address from some of them to others, at the time when their resolve was set on fleeing with their religion.

{And that which they worship} is in the accusative case, conjoined to the pronoun [in i‘tazaltumūhum]. It means: "And when you have withdrawn from them, and withdrawn from their objects of worship."

{Except Allah}

• It is permissible for this to be a connected exception (istithnā’ muttaṣil), based on what has been narrated: that they acknowledged the Creator but associated others with Him, just like the people of Mecca.
• It is also permissible for it to be a disconnected exception (munqaṭi‘).
• It has been said: It is a parenthetical statement, an informing from Allah—Exalted is He—about the group, that they did not worship anyone other than Allah.

{A place of refuge (mirfaqan)} It is read with both the fatḥa and the kasra on the mīm. It is that by which one benefits (yartafiqu bihi).

• Perhaps they said this out of confidence in the grace of Allah and the strength of their hope, due to their reliance upon Him and the purity of their certainty.
• Or perhaps a prophet in their era informed them of it.
• Or perhaps one of them was a prophet.

{And you see the sun, when it rises, inclining away from their cave to the right, and when it sets, passing them by on the left, while they are in a wide space thereof. That is from the signs of Allah. He whom Allah guides is the [rightly] guided, but he whom He leaves astray - never will you find for him a protecting guide.}