Tafseer of The Light · An-Noor · 24:54
Say, "Obey Allah and obey the Messenger; but if you turn away - then upon him is only that [duty] with which he has been charged, and upon you is that with which you have been charged. And if you obey him, you will be [rightly] guided. And there is not upon the Messenger except the [responsibility for] clear notification."
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: قُلْ — say — O Muḥammad — to these people who have sworn by Allah جَهْدَ أَيْمَانِهِمْ لَئِنْ أَمَرْتَهُمْ لَيَخْرُجُنَّ — and to the rest of your community: أَطِيعُوا اللَّهَ — obey Allah, O people, in what He has commanded and forbidden you — وَأَطِيعُوا الرَّسُولَ — for obedience to him is obedience to Allah. فَإِنْ تَوَلَّوْا — that is to say: if you turn away and turn your backs upon what the Messenger of Allah ﷺ has commanded or forbidden you, and refuse to consent to his judgment for and against you — فَإِنَّمَا عَلَيْهِ مَا حُمِّلَ — that is to say: the only thing incumbent upon him is to fulfill what he has been charged with, namely the conveying of Allah's message to you, just as he has been assigned to do — وَعَلَيْكُمْ مَا حُمِّلْتُمْ — that is to say: and upon you, O people, rests the duty to do what has been laid upon you and made obligatory for you: the following of His messenger ﷺ and the observance of obedience to him in what he has commanded and forbidden you.
We say that فَإِنْ تَوَلَّوْا has the meaning of "if you turn away" — an imperative form in the second person — for the reason that it is an address directed to those whom the Messenger of Allah has been charged to tell: أَطِيعُوا اللَّهَ وَأَطِيعُوا الرَّسُولَ . A proof of this is His word وَعَلَيْكُمْ مَا حُمِّلْتُمْ . If the word تَوَلَّوْا were a verb in the past tense in the sense of a report about an absent third party, then the text would read otherwise.
His word وَإِنْ تُطِيعُوهُ تَهْتَدُوا ("and if you obey him, you will be rightly guided"): Allah the Exalted says: if you — O people — obey the Messenger of Allah in what he commands and forbids you, you will follow the right path and find the truth in your affairs. وَمَا عَلَى الرَّسُولِ إِلا الْبَلاغُ الْمُبِينُ — that is to say: the one who is sent by Allah as a messenger to a people has only the task of conveying His message to them clearly, in such a manner that the message makes plain to them what Allah intends by it.
This means: upon Muḥammad — O people — rests nothing other than the conveying of Allah's message to you; the obedience is your task. If you obey him, that is for your own benefit which you attain; if you disobey him, that is your own souls which you ruin.
