Tafseer of The Women · An-Nisaa · 4:113
And if it was not for the favor of Allah upon you, [O Muhammad], and His mercy, a group of them would have determined to mislead you. But they do not mislead except themselves, and they will not harm you at all. And Allah has revealed to you the Book and wisdom and has taught you that which you did not know. And ever has the favor of Allah upon you been great.
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 explanation of His word: "There is no good in much of their secret conversations, except for him who enjoins charity, or what is good, or reconciliation between people. And whoever does that seeking the pleasure of Allah, We shall give him a tremendous reward." (4:114)
Abū Jaʿfar said: The Exalted means by His word "There is no good in much of their secret conversations": there is no good in much of the mutual whispering of all people together — "except for him who enjoins charity or what is good," and "what is good" (al-maʿrūf) is everything that Allah has commanded or to which He has urged of deeds of piety and goodness — "or reconciliation between people," and that is the reconciliation between those at variance or in dispute, in the manner in which Allah has permitted reconciling between them, so that the two of them return to that which contains harmony and unity of view, according to what Allah has permitted and commanded.
— Then the Exalted announced what He had promised to whoever does that, and said: "And whoever does that seeking the pleasure of Allah, We shall give him a tremendous reward," that is to say: and whoever enjoins charity or what is good in commanding it, or makes reconciliation between people — "seeking the pleasure of Allah," that is to say: seeking Allah's pleasure by performing that deed of his — "We shall give him a tremendous reward," that is to say: We shall give him a tremendous recompense for what he has done of that, and there is no limit to the extent of what Allah calls "tremendous" that anyone other than He knows.
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The people of Arabic philology (ahl al-ʿarabiyya) differed concerning the meaning of His word: "There is no good in much of their secret conversations, except for him who enjoins charity."
Some of the grammarians of Basra said: the meaning of that is: there is no good in much of their secret conversations, except in the conversation of him who enjoins charity — as though "him who" (man) were joined by way of conjunction to the "their" (the hāʾ and the mīm) that is in "their secret conversations." That, however, is incorrect according to the philologists, because "except" (illā) in a case like this does not conjoin upon the "hāʾ and the mīm," since these have not been reached by the negation.
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And some of the grammarians of Kufa said: "him who" (man) may stand in the case of the genitive (khafḍ) as well as in the accusative (naṣb). As for the genitive, that is according to your expression: there is no good in much of their secret conversations, except in him who enjoins charity. Then "the secret conversations" (al-najwā), according to this interpretation, are the whispering men themselves, as the Exalted says: مَا يَكُونُ مِنْ نَجْوَى ثَلاثَةٍ إِلا هُوَ رَابِعُهُمْ ("There is no secret conversation of three but He is the fourth of them") [sūrat al-Mujādalah: 7], and as He says: وَإِذْ هُمْ نَجْوَى ("And when they whispered together") [sūrat al-Isrāʾ: 47].
As for the accusative, that is by taking "the najwā" as a verbal notion (a maṣdar), so that it stands in the accusative, because it is then a disconnected exception (istithnāʾ munqaṭiʿ), since "him who" is other than "the najwā." Then that is comparable to the saying of the poet:
...... and in the dwelling-place there is none except the stone drinking-troughs — with difficulty can I distinguish them ......
And "him who" may also, according to this interpretation, stand in the nominative (rafʿ), as the poet says:
And a land in which no human dwells except the gazelles and the white camels.
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Abū Jaʿfar said: And the correct view among these statements about it is that one places "him who" (man) in the genitive, by referring back to "the najwā" — and that "the najwā" has the meaning of a plural of those who whisper to one another, formed on the pattern of "the drunken" (al-sukrā), "the wounded" (al-jarḥā), and "the sick" (al-marḍā). For that is the clearest of its meanings.
Then the explanation of the verse is: there is no good in much of those who whisper to one another, O Muhammad, among the people, except in him who enjoins charity, or what is good, or reconciliation between people, for in these the good is present.
