Tafseer of The Cow · Al-Baqara · 2:126
And [mention] when Abraham said, "My Lord, make this a secure city and provide its people with fruits - whoever of them believes in Allah and the Last Day." [Allah] said. "And whoever disbelieves - I will grant him enjoyment for a little; then I will force him to the punishment of the Fire, and wretched is the destination."
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.
The discourse on the explanation of His statement, the Exalted: وَإِذْ قَالَ إِبْرَاهِيمُ رَبِّ اجْعَلْ هَذَا بَلَدًا آمِنًا (And when Ibrāhīm said: "My Lord, make this a secure city.")
Abū Jaʿfar said: The Exalted, whose renown is exalted, means by His statement "And when Ibrāhīm said: My Lord, make this a secure city": and remember when Ibrāhīm said: My Lord, make this city a secure city.
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Abū Jaʿfar said: By His statement "secure" He means: secure from the tyrants and others gaining power over it, and secure from the punishment of Allah befalling it, as it befalls the rest of the cities, in the form of the sinking (of the earth), the overturning (upside down), the drowning, and other matters of Allah's wrath and His exemplary punishments that befall the remaining lands besides it — as in:
2026 — Bishr ibn Muʿādh related to us, saying: Yazīd related to us, saying: Saʿīd related to us, on the authority of Qatāda, who said: We were told that the sanctuary (al-ḥaram) is consecrated as sacred straight up to the Throne. And we were told that the House (al-bayt) descended with Ādam when he descended. Allah said to him: I cause My House to descend with you, around which circumambulation is made just as circumambulation is made around My Throne. So Ādam circumambulated it, and the believers who came after him, until, when the time of the Flood arrived — when Allah drowned the people of Nūḥ — He raised it up and purified it, and the punishment of the inhabitants of the earth did not reach it. Then Ibrāhīm followed a trace of it, and he built it upon an ancient foundation that had been there before him.
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If someone were to say to us: Was the sanctuary then not secure except after Ibrāhīm asked his Lord for security for it?
Then he is answered: Concerning this there is a difference of opinion. Some said: The sanctuary has always been secure from the punishment of Allah and from the punishment of the tyrants among His creatures, since the heavens and the earth were created. And they adduced as evidence for that what:
2027 — Abū Kurayb related to us, saying: Yūnus ibn Bukayr related to us, on the authority of Muḥammad ibn Isḥāq, who said: Saʿīd ibn Abī Saʿīd al-Maqburī related to me, saying: I heard Abū Shurayḥ al-Khuzāʿī saying: When Mecca was conquered, (the tribe of) Khuzāʿa killed a man of (the tribe of) Hudhayl. Thereupon the Messenger of Allah ﷺ stood up to deliver a sermon and said: "O people, verily, Allah made Mecca sacred on the day He created the heavens and the earth; so it is sacred by the sacredness of Allah until the Day of Resurrection. It is not permitted for any person who believes in Allah and the Last Day to shed blood there or to fell a tree there. Verily, it is not permitted to anyone after me, and it was not permitted to me either except for this single hour, out of wrath against its inhabitants. Verily, it has returned to its state as yesterday. Verily, let the present convey it to the absent. So whoever says: 'The Messenger of Allah ﷺ killed in it!' — then say to him: Verily, Allah permitted it for His Messenger and did not permit it for you."
2028 — Abū Kurayb related to us, saying: ʿAbd al-Raḥīm ibn Sulaymān related to us — and Ibn Ḥumayd and Ibn Wakīʿ related to us, both of them saying: Jarīr related to us — together, on the authority of Yazīd ibn Abī Ziyād, on the authority of Mujāhid, on the authority of Ibn ʿAbbās, who said: The Messenger of Allah ﷺ said concerning Mecca when he conquered it: This is a sanctuary that Allah made sacred on the day He created the heavens and the earth, and created the sun and the moon, and placed these two mountains (al-akhshabayn). It was not permitted to anyone before me and it will not be permitted to anyone after me; it was permitted to me for only one hour of the day.
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They said: Mecca is therefore, since it was created, a sanctuary, secure from the punishment of Allah and the punishment of the tyrants. They said: And the correctness of what we have said concerning this is confirmed by the second narration from the Messenger of Allah ﷺ that we have mentioned. They said: Ibrāhīm did not ask his Lord to make him secure from His punishment and the punishment of the tyrants, but rather he asked Him to make its inhabitants secure from droughts and famines, and to provide the dweller in it with fruits, as his Lord reported about him that he asked Him with His statement: "And when Ibrāhīm said: My Lord, make this a secure city and provide its inhabitants with fruits, namely whoever of them believes in Allah and the Last Day." They said: He asked his Lord that only because he had settled his progeny there, and it (the place) was without vegetation and without livestock; therefore he sought protection with his Lord against His causing them to perish there through hunger and thirst, and asked Him to make them secure from that which he feared for them.
They said: And how is it permissible that Ibrāhīm asked his Lord to consecrate the sanctuary, and to make him secure from His punishment and the punishment of the tyrants among His creatures, while it is he who — when he settled in it and alighted there with his family and children — said: رَبَّنَا إِنِّي أَسْكَنْتُ مِنْ ذُرِّيَّتِي بِوَادٍ غَيْرِ ذِي زَرْعٍ عِنْدَ بَيْتِكَ الْمُحَرَّمِ [Surah Ibrāhīm: 37] (Our Lord, verily, I have caused some of my progeny to dwell in a valley without vegetation, by Your sacred House)? They said: If Ibrāhīm were the one who consecrated the sanctuary, or asked his Lord for its consecration, then he would not have said "by Your sacred House" at his alighting there; rather, it had been consecrated before him, and it was also consecrated after him.
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And others said: The sanctuary was profane (permitted) before the supplication of Ibrāhīm, like the rest of the lands besides it, and it became sacred only through Ibrāhīm's consecration of it, just as the city of the Messenger of Allah ﷺ was profane before its consecration by the Messenger of Allah ﷺ. They said: And the evidence for what we have said concerning that is what:
2029 — Ibn Bashshār related it to us, saying: ʿAbd al-Raḥmān ibn Mahdī related to us, saying: Sufyān related to us, on the authority of Abū al-Zubayr, on the authority of Jābir ibn ʿAbd Allāh, who said: The Messenger of Allah ﷺ said: "Verily, Ibrāhīm consecrated the House of Allah and made it a place of security, and verily, I have consecrated Medina, that which lies between its two lava fields: its thornbushes and its game. Its thornbushes may not be cut."
2030 — Abū Kurayb and Abū al-Sāʾib related to us, both of them saying: [Ibn Idrīs related to us — and Abū Kurayb informed us, saying]: ʿAbd al-Raḥīm al-Rāzī related to us, [both of them saying]: We heard Ashʿath, on the authority of Nāfiʿ, on the authority of Abū Hurayra, who said: The Messenger of Allah ﷺ said: Verily, Ibrāhīm was the servant of Allah and His bosom friend, and verily, I am the servant of Allah and His Messenger, and verily, Ibrāhīm consecrated Mecca, and verily, I have consecrated Medina, that which lies between its two lava fields: its thornbushes and its game. No weapon for fighting may be carried there, and no tree may be cut there except as fodder for a camel.
2031 — Abū Kurayb related to us, saying: Qutayba ibn Saʿīd related to us, saying: Bakr ibn Muḍar related to us, on the authority of Ibn al-Hād, on the authority of Abū Bakr ibn Muḥammad, on the authority of ʿAbd Allāh ibn ʿAmr ibn ʿUthmān, on the authority of Rāfiʿ ibn Khadīj, who said: The Messenger of Allah ﷺ said: "Verily, Ibrāhīm consecrated Mecca, and verily, I consecrate Medina, that which lies between its two lava fields."
And what resembles that, of the narrations, the inclusion of which would make the book too long.
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They said: And Allah, the Exalted whose renown is exalted, has reported in His Book that Ibrāhīm said: "My Lord, make this a secure city", and He did not report about him that he asked for it to be made secure with respect to some matters and not others. So no one has the right to claim that what he asked concerning that was its security with respect to some matters and not others, except on the basis of an evidence to which one must submit. They said: And as for the narration of Abū Shurayḥ and Ibn ʿAbbās, those are two narrations by which no evidence is established, because of the reasons in their chains of transmission (asānīd) on the basis of which one need not submit to them.
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Abū Jaʿfar said: And the correct judgment concerning this, according to us, is: that Allah, the Exalted whose renown is exalted, made Mecca a sanctuary when He created it and brought it into being, as the Prophet ﷺ reported "that He consecrated it on the day He created the heavens and the earth" — without a consecration of it by Him upon the tongue of any of His prophets and messengers, but rather by His repelling whoever wished to do it harm, and by His averting from it — and from its inhabitants — the calamities and punishments by way of retribution that have befallen others than it and its inhabitants. And thus its state remained until Allah gave it as a dwelling place to Ibrāhīm, His bosom friend, and settled there his family: Hājar and his son Ismāʿīl. Then Ibrāhīm at that moment asked his Lord to impose the obligation of its consecration upon His servants by his tongue, so that this would be an established practice (sunna) for whoever of His creatures would come after him, by which they would orient themselves in it — since the Exalted whose renown is exalted had taken him as a bosom friend and had informed him that He would make him an imam for the people who is followed. Then his Lord answered that which he asked, and He imposed upon His servants at that moment the obligation of its consecration by his tongue.
Thus Mecca became — after it had been protected by Allah's repelling from it, without Allah's having imposed upon His servants the obligation of refraining from it, and had been sacred by Allah's averting from it, without His having consecrated it upon the tongue of any of His messengers — its consecration an obligation upon His creatures, upon the tongue of His bosom friend Ibrāhīm, peace be upon him, and it became obligatory upon His servants to refrain from profaning it, and from profaning its game and its thornbushes, by His making refraining from that obligatory, by Ibrāhīm's conveying to them Allah's message about that to him.
For this reason its consecration is attributed to Ibrāhīm, and the Messenger of Allah ﷺ said: "Verily, Ibrāhīm consecrated Mecca." And the Messenger of Allah ﷺ said: "Verily, Allah consecrated Mecca." For the obligation of its consecration, which Allah imposed upon His servants as a form of worship of Him thereby — distinct from the consecration by which He continuously kept it in service before that as a form of protection and preservation of it — came about through Ibrāhīm's asking his Lord to impose its obligation by his tongue, [and it is that] whose obligation bound the servants, and not anything else.
Thus, then, by what we have said, the correctness of the meaning of both narrations has become clear — I mean the narration of Abū Shurayḥ and Ibn ʿAbbās from the Prophet ﷺ that he said: "And verily, Allah consecrated Mecca on the day He created the sun and the moon" — and the narration of Jābir, Abū Hurayra, Rāfiʿ ibn Khadīj, and others: that the Prophet ﷺ said: "O Allah, verily, Ibrāhīm consecrated Mecca"; and that the one does not refute the correctness of the meaning of the other, as some of the ignorant supposed.
And it is not permissible in the narrations of the Messenger of Allah ﷺ that one should refute the other, when their correctness is established. And both narrations transmitted concerning this from the Messenger of Allah ﷺ have come in a clear, widespread manner, which cuts off the excuse of whoever it reaches.
And as for the statement of Ibrāhīm, peace be upon him: رَبَّنَا إِنِّي أَسْكَنْتُ مِنْ ذُرِّيَّتِي بِوَادٍ غَيْرِ ذِي زَرْعٍ عِنْدَ بَيْتِكَ الْمُحَرَّمِ [Surah Ibrāhīm: 37] (Our Lord, verily, I have caused some of my progeny to dwell in a valley without vegetation, by Your sacred House) — if he said that before Allah's imposing the obligation of its consecration by his tongue upon His creatures, then he meant by it only Allah's consecration of it, which He had consecrated through His preservation and protection of it, without His consecration of it for His creatures as a form of worship for them thereby. And if he said that after Allah's consecration of it for His creatures as a form of worship, then no one has anything to object against us concerning that.
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The discourse on the explanation of His statement, the Exalted: وَارْزُقْ أَهْلَهُ مِنَ الثَّمَرَاتِ مَنْ آمَنَ مِنْهُمْ بِاللَّهِ وَالْيَوْمِ الآخِرِ (And provide its inhabitants with fruits, namely whoever of them believes in Allah and the Last Day.)
Abū Jaʿfar said: And this is a request of Ibrāhīm to his Lord: that He provide the believers among the inhabitants of Mecca with fruits, not the unbelievers among them. And he designated the request for that for the believers and not the unbelievers, because Allah had informed him — at his asking Him to make from his progeny imams who are followed — that among them would be the unbeliever, who does not attain His covenant, and the wrongdoer, who does not acquire His office of authority. So when he knew that among his progeny would be the wrongdoer and the unbeliever, he designated his request to his Lord for providing from the fruits the believer among the inhabitants of Mecca, and not the unbeliever. And Allah said to him: Verily, I have answered your supplication, and I will provide, along with the believers among the inhabitants of this city, also its unbelievers, and I will let them enjoy it for a short while.
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And as for "whoever" (man) in His statement "whoever of them believes in Allah and the Last Day", that stands in the accusative as a further specification and clarification of "the inhabitants" (al-ahl), as the Exalted said: يَسْأَلُونَكَ عَنِ الشَّهْرِ الْحَرَامِ قِتَالٍ فِيهِ [Surah Al-Baqarah: 217] (They ask you about the sacred month, about fighting (qitāl) therein), with the meaning: they ask you about fighting in the sacred month. And as the Exalted whose renown is exalted said: وَلِلَّهِ عَلَى النَّاسِ حِجُّ الْبَيْتِ مَنِ اسْتَطَاعَ إِلَيْهِ سَبِيلا [Surah Āl ʿImrān: 97] (And Allah has upon the people the right to the pilgrimage to the House, whoever can find a way to it), with the meaning: And Allah has the right to the pilgrimage to the House upon whoever can find a way to it.
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And Ibrāhīm asked his Lord only for that which he asked of it, because he alighted in a valley without vegetation, without water, and without inhabitants. Therefore he asked that He provide its inhabitants with fruits, and that He incline the hearts of the people toward them. And it is related that when Ibrāhīm asked that of his Lord, Allah moved al-Ṭāʾif from Palestine (Filasṭīn).
2032 — Al-Muthannā related to me, saying: Isḥāq ibn al-Ḥajjāj related to us, saying: Hishām related to us, saying: I read aloud to Muḥammad ibn Muslim that when Ibrāhīm supplicated for the sanctuary: "And provide its inhabitants with fruits", Allah moved al-Ṭāʾif from Palestine.
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The discourse on the explanation of His statement, the Exalted: قَالَ وَمَنْ كَفَرَ فَأُمَتِّعُهُ قَلِيلا (He said: And whoever disbelieves, him I will let enjoy for a short while.)
Abū Jaʿfar said: The people of interpretation (ahl al-taʾwīl) differed concerning the speaker of this statement, and concerning the manner of its reading. Some said: The speaker of this statement is our Lord, the Exalted whose renown is exalted, and its interpretation according to their view is: He said: And whoever disbelieves, him I will let enjoy for a short while with My provision of fruits in this world, until his appointed term comes to him. And the one who held this view read it as "fa-umattiʿuhu qalīlan" (him I will let enjoy for a short while), with doubling of the "tāʾ" and nominative of the "ʿayn".
* Mention of who said that:
2033 — Al-Muthannā related to me, saying: Isḥāq related to us, saying: Ibn Abī Jaʿfar related to us, on the authority of his father, on the authority of al-Rabīʿ, who said: Abū al-ʿĀliya related to me, on the authority of Ubayy ibn Kaʿb, concerning His statement: "And whoever disbelieves, him I will let enjoy for a short while, then I will compel him to the punishment of the Fire", he said: This is the statement of the Lord, the Exalted whose renown is exalted.
2034 — Ibn Ḥumayd related to us, saying: Salama related to us, saying: Ibn Isḥāq said: When Ibrāhīm said: رَبِّ اجْعَلْ هَذَا بَلَدًا آمِنًا وَارْزُقْ أَهْلَهُ مِنَ الثَّمَرَاتِ مَنْ آمَنَ مِنْهُمْ بِاللَّهِ وَالْيَوْمِ الآخِرِ (My Lord, make this a secure city and provide its inhabitants with fruits, namely whoever of them believes in Allah and the Last Day), and averted the supplication from whoever Allah refused to grant the office of authority — out of devotion to Allah, and out of love (for Him) and aversion to whoever contradicted His command, even if they belonged to his progeny, when he knew that among them would be a wrongdoer who does not attain His covenant, by His report about that when He informed him — then Allah said: And whoever disbelieves — for I provide the pious and the sinner — him I will let enjoy for a short while.
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And others said: Rather, Ibrāhīm, the bosom friend of the Most Merciful, said that as a request of his to his Lord to provide the unbeliever too with fruits in the sacred city, equal to that with which the believer is provided, and to let him enjoy it for a short while — ثُمَّ أَضْطَرُّهُ إِلَى عَذَابِ النَّارِ (then I will compel him to the punishment of the Fire) — with lightening of the "tāʾ" and jussive of the "ʿayn", and the "rāʾ" of "aḍṭarrahu" with fatḥa, and with the pronunciation of "thumma aḍṭarrahu" without elision of its alif — as a supplication of Ibrāhīm to his Lord for them and a request.
* Mention of who said that:
2035 — Al-Muthannā related to me, saying: Isḥāq related to us, saying: Ibn Abī Jaʿfar related to us, on the authority of his father, on the authority of al-Rabīʿ, who said: Abū al-ʿĀliya said: Ibn ʿAbbās used to say: That is the statement of Ibrāhīm, who asks his Lord: whoever disbelieves, let him enjoy for a short while.
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2036 — Al-Muthannā related to us, saying: Isḥāq related to us, saying: Ibn Abī Jaʿfar related to us, on the authority of Layth, on the authority of Mujāhid: "And whoever disbelieves, him I will let enjoy for a short while", he says: And whoever disbelieves, him too I will provide, then I will compel him to the punishment of the Fire.
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Abū Jaʿfar said: And the correct reading of that, according to us, and the correct interpretation, is that which Ubayy ibn Kaʿb said and his reading, because the evidence is established by the widespread transmission that testifies with certain knowledge to the correctness of that, and to the anomalous (shādhdh) character of the reading that contradicts it. And it is not permissible to raise objection with that which in its transmission may be subject to errors and mistakes, against that which in its transmission is not subject to that. And since that is so, the interpretation of the verse is: Allah said: O Ibrāhīm, verily, I have answered your supplication, and I have provided the believers among the inhabitants of this city with fruits and also its unbelievers, as an enjoyment for them until the reaching of their appointed terms, then I will compel its unbelievers after that to the Fire.
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And as for His statement "him I will let enjoy for a short while", He means: I will make that with which I provide him thereof during his life an enjoyment which he enjoys until the time of his death.
And we said only that it is so, because Allah, the Exalted whose renown is exalted, said that to Ibrāhīm only as an answer to his request for which he asked, namely the provision of fruits for the believers among the inhabitants of Mecca. From this, then, it was known that the answer pertains only to that which Ibrāhīm asked and not to anything else. And in accordance with what we have said concerning that, Mujāhid spoke, and we have already mentioned the narration about that from him.
And some said: Its interpretation is: him I will let enjoy continued existence in this world.
And another said: Him I will let enjoy for a short while in his disbelief as long as he dwells in Mecca, until I send Muḥammad ﷺ, who will kill him if he persists in his disbelief, or will expel him from it. And although that is a meaning which the text can bear, the evidence of the clear wording points to the contrary of it, for what we have described.
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The discourse on the explanation of His statement, the Exalted: ثُمَّ أَضْطَرُّهُ إِلَى عَذَابِ النَّارِ (Then I will compel him to the punishment of the Fire.)
Abū Jaʿfar said: The Exalted whose renown is exalted means by His statement "then I will compel him to the punishment of the Fire": then I will drive him to the punishment of the Fire and propel him toward it, as the Exalted whose renown is exalted said: يَوْمَ يُدَعُّونَ إِلَى نَارِ جَهَنَّمَ دَعًّا [Surah al-Ṭūr: 13] (On the day they are thrust toward the Fire of Hell (jahannam) with a forceful thrust).
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And the meaning of "al-iḍṭirār" is compulsion. One says: "I compelled someone to this matter (iḍṭarartu)", when you constrain him to it and bring him to it.
That, then, is the meaning of His statement "then I will compel him to the punishment of the Fire": I will drive him toward it and propel him, dragging and hauling him upon his face.
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The discourse on the explanation of His statement, the Exalted: وَبِئْسَ الْمَصِيرُ (126) (And evil is the destination.)
Abū Jaʿfar said: We have already shown that "biʾsa" is originally "biʾisa", from "al-buʾs" (misery); its second letter was made vowelless (stripped of its vowel), and the vowel of the second letter was transferred to the first, just as one said for "al-kabid" (liver) "al-kibd", and what resembles that.
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And the meaning of the statement is: and evil is the destination, the punishment of the Fire, after that in which they were of the enjoyment of this world with which I let them enjoy therein.
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And as for "al-maṣīr" (the destination), that is a form "mafʿil" from the statement of someone: "I came to a good destination" (ṣirtu maṣīran ṣāliḥan), and it is the place where the one who disbelieves in Allah ends up, of the punishment of the Fire.