Tafsir of Luqman 31:33

{لا يجزى} (No one shall avail): It means no one shall satisfy anything on his behalf. From this, the one who demands payment is called al-mutajazi. In the hadith regarding Judha‘ah ibn Niyar: "It shall suffice for you, but it shall not suffice for anyone after you." It is also recited as {لا يجزىء} (it shall not avail/suffice), meaning it shall not be of any use. It is said: "I have sufficed for you in the place of so-and-so." The meaning is: "Nothing shall be accepted in it."

{الغرور} (The Deceiver): It is Satan. It is also said: It is the worldly life. It is also said: It is your hoping for forgiveness while persisting in disobedience. Sa‘id ibn Jubayr (may Allah be pleased with him) said: "Being deceived by Allah is for a man to persist in sin while hoping for forgiveness from Allah." It is also said: "Your remembering your good deeds while forgetting your bad ones is deception." It is also recited with a damma on the ghayn (al-ghurur), which is the verbal noun of gharrah (to deceive). The deceiver is made into the deception itself, as one says: "His seriousness has become serious." Or, it may refer to the adornment of the world, for it is a deception.

If you ask: The statement {ولا مولود هو جاز عن والده شيئا} (nor shall a child avail his father anything) comes in a form of emphasis that the preceding clause does not possess.

I say: That is correct. The nominal sentence is more emphatic than the verbal one. Added to this is the phrase {هو جاز عن والده شيئا} and the word {مولود}. The reason for this structure is that the address is directed at the believers and their elite, whose fathers died in disbelief and upon the religion of ignorance. It was intended to cut off their hopes—and the hopes of others—that they might benefit their fathers in the Hereafter, intercede for them, or avail them anything against Allah. Therefore, it was brought in the most emphatic form.

The meaning of the emphasis in the word {مولود} (the child born) is that if one of them were to intercede for the immediate father who begot him, his intercession would not be accepted, let alone for his ancestors further up. For the term walad (child) applies to the child and the grandchild, whereas mawlud (the one born) specifically refers to the one born from you.

{Indeed, Allah—with Him is the knowledge of the Hour, and He sends down the rain, and He knows what is in the wombs. And no soul knows what it will earn tomorrow, and no soul knows in what land it will die. Indeed, Allah is Knowing, Acquainted.}