Tafseer of The Night Journey · Al-Israa · 17:68
Then do you feel secure that [instead] He will not cause a part of the land to swallow you or send against you a storm of stones? Then you would not find for yourselves an advocate.
Important: The Arabic source text is always authoritative. This translation is a study aid and has not been verified by scholars — do not use it as a basis for religious proof or for deriving rulings (ahkam). When in doubt, always consult the Arabic text and a qualified scholar.
Allah the Exalted says: أَفَأَمِنْتُمْ — "Do you feel secure, O people, against your Lord?" After you have denied His favor — His rescue of you from the terror you endured at sea and the impending destruction to which you were exposed — and after, once saved and on dry land, you became disobedient to Him and associated others besides Him as partners in His worship: أَنْ يَخْسِفَ بِكُمْ جَانِبَ الْبَرِّ — that is: to cause the dry land to sink beneath you — أَوْ يُرْسِلَ عَلَيْكُمْ حَاصِبًا — that is: that He should rain down upon you stones from the sky to kill you, as He did with the people of Lūṭ — ثُمَّ لا تَجِدُوا لَكُمْ وَكِيلا : He says: "Then you will find nothing to act on your behalf in defense against His punishment and to protect you against it."
In the same vein as what we have expounded here, the people of interpretation spoke.
Mention of who said that:
Bishr related to us, saying: Yazīd related to us, saying: Saʿīd related to us, on the authority of Qatāda, concerning His words أَفَأَمِنْتُمْ أَنْ يَخْسِفَ بِكُمْ جَانِبَ الْبَرِّ أَوْ يُرْسِلَ عَلَيْكُمْ حَاصِبًا : he said: "That is: stones from the sky. ثُمَّ لا تَجِدُوا لَكُمْ وَكِيلا — that is: no protector and no helper."
Al-Qāsim related to us, saying: al-Ḥusayn related to us, saying: Ḥajjāj related to me, on the authority of Ibn Jurayj, concerning أَفَأَمِنْتُمْ أَنْ يَخْسِفَ بِكُمْ جَانِبَ الْبَرِّ أَوْ يُرْسِلَ عَلَيْكُمْ حَاصِبًا : he said: "A rain of stones when you come out of the sea."
One of the people of linguistic learning had the interpretation of أَوْ يُرْسِلَ عَلَيْكُمْ حَاصِبًا as follows: "Or that He should send against you a violent storm that hurls stones (tuḥṣibu)" — and he cited as proof the verse of the poet:
We coming to meet the north winds of the Shām, which struck us with pebble-stone (ḥāṣib) like loosened cotton fibers.
The root form of al-ḥāṣib is the wind that throws pebbles (ḥaṣbāʾ) over the earth — the earth with sand and small pebbles. One says: "So-and-so pelted so-and-so (ḥaṣaba)" when he threw pebbles at him. The wind was described as ḥaṣiba because it pelts people with them, as al-Akhṭal said:
And indeed I knew, when the pregnant she-camels returned, the young ostriches waddling with the north wind behind them, pelting the thornbushes with pebble-stone (ḥāṣib) of its snow, until the snow piled up upon the thornbushes.