Tabari (1 passage)

1. Full Dutch translation of Tabari's text

   The discourse on the explanation of His statement, Mighty and Exalted is He: وَإِلَهُكُمْ إِلَهٌ وَاحِدٌ لا إِلَهَ إِلا هُوَ الرَّحْمَنُ الرَّحِيمُ (163)

   (And your god is one God; there is no god but He, the Most Compassionate, the Most Merciful) (2:163)

   Abū Jaʿfar said: We have already previously expounded the meaning of "godhood" (al-ulūhiyya), namely that it pertains to the worship rendered by created beings.⁹¹

   The meaning of His statement: "And your god is one God; there is no god but He, the Most Compassionate, the Most Merciful" is therefore: He who, O people, has a right to your obedience and deserves worship from you is one Worshipped One and one Lord. So worship none other than Him, and set up no partner alongside Him. For that which you add to Him as a partner in your worship of Him is but a creature from the creation of your god, just like you yourselves; whereas your god is one God, who has no equal and no peer.

   * * *

   People have differed concerning the meaning of His oneness (waḥdāniyya), exalted is His mention.

   Some said: The meaning of the oneness of Allah is the meaning of negating any of His kind or equal to Him, as one says: "So-and-so is the only one among the people — he is the sole one of his people," by which is meant that he has no equal among the people, and in his people no likeness nor peer. Such too is the meaning of the statement: "Allah is one," by which is meant: Allah has no equal and no peer.

   They claimed that what indicated to them the correctness of their interpretation is the fact that the statement of the speaker "one" (wāḥid) can denote four meanings. The first of them: that it is "one" of a kind, as the single human being is "one" of mankind. The second: that it is indivisible, like the part that does not allow itself to be divided.⁹² The third: that by it is meant the like and the resemblance, as in the statement of the speaker: "These two things are one," by which is meant that they resemble one another, until through their agreement in attributes they have become as a single thing. The fourth: that by it is meant the negation of any peer and any equal to Him.

   They said: Since the three meanings of the meanings of "the one" have been removed from Him, the fourth meaning which we have described has proven correct.

   * * *

   Others said: The meaning of His oneness, exalted is His mention, is the meaning of His being set apart from things and the things being set apart from Him. They said: He alone is set apart, because He does not enter into any thing and no thing enters into Him. They said: And there is no validity for the statement of the speaker "one" with regard to all things, except in this sense. And the adherents of this view rejected the four meanings which the others had mentioned.

   * * *

   As for His statement: "there is no god but He," that is an announcement from Him, exalted is His mention, that there is no Lord for the worlds besides Him, and that none besides Him deserves a claim to the worship rendered by the servants, and that all that is besides Him is His creation, and that it is incumbent upon them all to obey Him and submit to His command, and to abandon the worship of all that is besides Him in the way of partners and gods, and to forsake the idols and the false deities. For all of that is His creation, and it is incumbent upon them all to render the submission due to Him by acknowledging His oneness and His godhood. And godhood belongs to none but Him alone, since all the favors they possess in this world come from Him — and not from the idols they worship and the partners they add to Him;⁹³ and the favor that will accrue to them in the Hereafter comes from Him; and the partners they add to Him can neither harm nor benefit, neither in the short term nor in the long term, neither in this world nor in the Hereafter.

   This is an admonition from Allah, exalted is His mention, to the people who ascribe partners to Him, concerning their error, and a summons from Him to them to turn back from their disbelief and to desist from their shirk.

   Then He made known to them, exalted is His mention, by means of the verse that follows this one, the place where the people of understanding among them could derive the proof for the reality of that to which He had directed them concerning His oneness (tawḥīd) and His clear proofs that cut off their excuse. He therefore said, exalted is His mention: O polytheists (mushrikīn), if you are ignorant of or in doubt about the reality of the announcement I have made to you — that your god is one God, and not that whose godhood you claim for partners and idols — then ponder My proofs and reflect upon them. For among My proofs are: the creation of the heavens and the earth, and the alternation of night and day, and the ships that sail upon the sea with that which benefits people, and the water that I have sent down from the sky by which I have brought the earth to life after its death, and all the living creatures that I have spread abroad over it, and the clouds that I have made subservient between the heaven and the earth. If, then, that which you worship of idols, gods, and partners, and all the rest with which you ascribe partners — when all of that gathers together and assists one another, or a part of it apart from another part — is able to create the like of anything of My creation which I have enumerated to you, then at that moment you would have an excuse for your worship of that which you worship besides Me. But if not, then there is for you no excuse in taking a god besides Me, and there is for you and for that which you worship no god but Me. Let the people of understanding, then, ponder the conciseness with which Allah has conducted His argument against all the people who disbelieve in Him and who stray from His oneness, in this verse and in the one that follows it — with the most concise wording, the most effective proof, and the subtlest meaning, by which they are raised to the knowledge of the excellence of Allah's wisdom and His exposition.

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   Footnotes:

   (91) See the foregoing 1: 122-126.

   (92) In the printed edition it reads "ghayr mutaṣarrif" (not disposing), which is a scribal error; the correct reading is what is established here [ghayr mutafarriq, indivisible].

   (93) "Al-ashrāk" is the plural of "sharīk" (partner), as one says: "sharīf" and "ashrāf," and "naṣīr" and "anṣār"; it is also formed in the plural as "shurakāʾ."

   Show original Arabic

   القول في تأويل قوله عز وجل : وَإِلَهُكُمْ إِلَهٌ وَاحِدٌ لا إِلَهَ إِلا هُوَ الرَّحْمَنُ الرَّحِيمُ (163) قال أبو جعفر: قد بينا فيما مضى معنى " الألوهية "، وأنها اعتباد الخلق. (91) فمعنى قوله: " وإلهكم إلهٌ واحدٌ لا إلهَ إلا هو الرحمن الرحيم ": والذي يستحق عَليكم أيها الناس الطاعةَ له, ويستوجب منكم العبادة، معبودٌ واحدٌ وربٌّ واحد, فلا تعبدوا غيرَه، ولا تشركوا معه سواه، فإنّ من تُشركونه معه في عبادتكم إياه، هو خَلقٌ من خلق إلهكم مثلكم, وإلهكم إله واحد، لا مثلَ لهُ وَلا نَظير. * * * واختُلِف في معنى وَحدانيته تعالى ذكره, فقال بعضهم: معنى وحدانية الله، معنى نَفي الأشباه والأمثال عنه، كما يقال: " فلان واحدُ الناس - وهو وَاحد قومه ", يعني بذلك أنه ليسَ له في الناس مثل, ولا له في قومه شبيه ولا نظيرٌ. فكذلك معنى قول: " اللهُ واحد ", يعني به: الله لا مثل له ولا نظير. فزعموا أن الذي دلَّهم على صحة تأويلهم ذلك، أنّ قول القائل: " واحد " يفهم لمعان أربعة. أحدها: أن يكون " واحدًا " من جنس، كالإنسان " الواحد " من الإنس. والآخر: أن يكون غير متفرِّق، كالجزء الذي لا ينقسم. (92) والثالث: &; 3-266 &; أن يكون معنيًّا به: المِثلُ والاتفاق، كقول القائل: " هذان الشيئان واحد ", يراد بذلك: أنهما متشابهان، حتى صارَا لاشتباههما في المعاني كالشيء الواحد. والرابع: أن يكون مرادًا به نفي النظير عنه والشبيه. قالوا: فلما كانت المعاني الثلاثةُ من معاني" الواحد " منتفيةً عنه، صح المعنى الرابع الذي وَصَفناه. * * * وقال آخرون: معنى " وحدانيته " تعالى ذكره، معنى انفراده من الأشياء، وانفراد الأشياء منه. قالوا: وإنما كان منفردًا وحده, لأنه غير داخل في شيء ولا داخلٌ فيه شيء. قالوا: ولا صحة لقول القائل: " واحد "، من جميع الأشياء إلا ذلك. وأنكر قائلو هذه المقالة المعاني الأربعةَ التي قالها الآخرون. * * * وأما قوله: " لا إله إلا هو "، فإنه خبرٌ منه تعالى ذكره أنه لا رب للعالمين غيرُه, ولا يستوجبُ على العبادِ العبادةَ سواه, وأنّ كلّ ما سواه فهُم خَلقه, والواجبُ على جميعهم طاعته والانقيادُ لأمره، وتركُ عبادة ما سواه من الأنداد والآلهة، وهجْر الأوثان والأصنام. لأنّ جميع ذلك خلقُه، وعلى جميعهم الدينونة له بالوحدانية والألوهة, ولا تَنبغي الألوهة إلا له, إذ كان ما بهم من نعمة في الدنيا فمنه، دون ما يعبدونه من الأوثان ويشركون معه من الأشراك؛ (93) وما يصيرون إليه من نعمة في الآخرة فمنه, وأن ما أشركوا معه من الأشراك لا يضر ولا ينفعُ في عاجل ولا في آجل, ولا في دنيا ولا في آخرة. وهذا تنبيه من الله تعالى ذكره أهلَ الشرك به على ضلالهم, ودعاءٌ منه لهم إلى الأوبة من كفرهم, والإنابة من شركهم. &; 3-267 &; ثم عرَّفهم تعالى ذكره بالآية التي تتلوها، موضعَ استدلال ذوي الألباب منهم على حقيقة ما نبَّههم عليه من توحيده وحُججه الواضحة القاطعة عُذرَهم, فقال تعالى ذكره: أيها المشركون، إن جهلتم أو شككتم في حقيقة ما أخبرتكم من الخبر: من أنّ إلهكم إله واحد، دونَ ما تدَّعون ألوهيته من الأنداد والأوثان, فتدبروا حُججي وفكروا فيها, فإن من حُججي خَلق السموات والأرض, واختلاف الليل والنهار, والفلكُ التي تجري في البحر بما يَنفعُ الناس, وما أنـزلت من السماء من ماء فأحييت به الأرض بعد موتها, وما بثثتُ فيها من كل دابة, والسحاب الذي سَخرته بين السماء والأرض. فإن كان ما تعبدونه من الأوثان والآلهة والأنداد وسائر ما تشركون به، إذا اجتمع جميعه فتظاهرَ أو انفرد بعضُه دون بعض، يقدر على أن يخلق نظيرَ شيء من خَلقي الذي سميتُ لكم, فلكم بعبادتكم ما تعبدون من دوني حينئذ عذرٌ, وإلا فلا عُذر لكم في اتخاذ إله سواي, ولا إله لكم ولما تعبدون غَيري. فليتدبر أولو الألباب إيجازَ الله احتجاجَه على جميع أهل الكفر به والملحدين في توحيده، في هذه الآية وفي التي بعدها، بأوْجز كلام، وأبلغ حجة وألطف معنى يشرف بهم على مَعرفة فضْل حكمة الله وبَيانه. * * * -------------------- الهوامش : (91) انظر ما سلف 1 : 122-126 . (92) في المطبوعة : "غير متصرف" ، وهو تصحيف ، والصواب ما أثبت . (93) الأشراك جمع شريك ، كما يقال : شريف وأشراف ، ونصير وأنصار ، ويجمع أيضًا على"شركاء" .