Tafseer of Mary · Maryam · 19:89
You have done an atrocious thing.
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.
ʿAlī related to me — he said: ʿAbd Allāh related to us — he said: Muʿāwiya related to me, on the authority of ʿAlī, on the authority of Ibn ʿAbbās, concerning His word: شَيْئًا إِدًّا — he said: "A tremendous word (qawlan ʿaẓīman)."
Muḥammad ibn Saʿd related to me — he said: my father related to me — he said: my uncle related to me — he said: my father related to me, on the authority of his father, on the authority of Ibn ʿAbbās, concerning His word: لَقَدْ جِئْتُمْ شَيْئًا إِدًّا — he said: "Verily, you have brought something tremendous: the abominableness of the utterance."
Muḥammad ibn ʿAmr related to me — he said: Abū ʿĀṣim related to us — he said: ʿĪsā related to us; and al-Ḥārith related to me — he said: al-Ḥasan related to us — he said: Warqāʾ related to us — both on the authority of Ibn Abī Najīḥ, on the authority of Mujāhid, concerning His word: شَيْئًا إِدًّا — he said: "Tremendous."
Al-Qāsim related to us — he said: al-Ḥusayn related to us — he said: Ḥajjāj related to me, on the authority of Ibn Jurayj, on the authority of Mujāhid — similarly.
Al-Ḥasan ibn Yaḥyā related to us — he said: ʿAbd al-Razzāq informed us — he said: Maʿmar informed us, on the authority of Qatāda, concerning His word: شَيْئًا إِدًّا — he said: "Tremendous."
Yūnus related to me — he said: Ibn Wahb informed us — he said: Ibn Zayd said concerning His word: لَقَدْ جِئْتُمْ شَيْئًا إِدًّا — he said: "You have brought a tremendous matter by ascribing a child to the All-Merciful."
The word al-idd has three dialectal forms; one says: "You have brought something tremendous" — iddan, with kasra on the alif; addan, with fatḥa on the alif; and ādan, with fatḥa and lengthening of the alif, after the pattern of mādd (the fāʿil form). The reciters of the metropolises (qurrāʾ al-amṣār) — and this is the reading we adopt — read it with kasra; however, it has been reported of Abū ʿAbd al-Raḥmān al-Sulamī that he read it with fatḥa on the alif, but I do not regard his reading thus as correct, because of its deviation from the reading of the reciters of the metropolises.
The Arabs call every tremendous matter: idd, imr, and nukr. This is indicated by the word of the poet (rājiz):
"Verily, the enemies have experienced from me the unfamiliar (nukrā), a tremendous, severe, bewildering calamity (dāhiyatun dahyāʾu iddun imrā)."
And the word of another poet:
"In a severe thirst and exhaustion, tremendous (iddan)."
