Tafseer of The Winnowing Winds · Adh-Dhaariyat · 51:13
[It is] the Day they will be tormented over the Fire
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.
And His words يَوْمَ هُمْ عَلَى النَّارِ يُفْتَنُونَ ("on the Day when they are tried over the Fire") (51:13): the Exalted, whose remembrance is exalted, says: on the Day when they are tried over the fire of Hell (jahannam).
The scholars of interpretation (ahl al-taʾwīl) differed concerning the meaning of His words يُفْتَنُونَ ("being tried") in this passage. Some of them said: what is meant by it is that they are punished by being burned in the fire.
* Mention of who said that:
ʿAlī related to me, saying: Abū Ṣāliḥ related to us, saying: Muʿāwiya related to me, on the authority of ʿAlī, on the authority of Ibn ʿAbbās, concerning His words يَوْمَ هُمْ عَلَى النَّارِ يُفْتَنُونَ ("on the Day when they are tried over the Fire"), he says: they are punished.
Muḥammad ibn Saʿd related to me, saying: my father related to me, saying: my uncle related to me, saying: my father related to me, on the authority of his father, on the authority of Ibn ʿAbbās, concerning His words يَسْأَلُونَ أَيَّانَ يَوْمُ الدِّينِ * يَوْمَ هُمْ عَلَى النَّارِ يُفْتَنُونَ ("they ask: when is the Day of Judgement? On the Day when they are tried over the Fire"), he said: their trial is that they asked about the Day of Judgement while they are held over the fire — ذُوقُوا فِتْنَتَكُمْ هَذَا الَّذِي كُنْتُمْ بِهِ تَسْتَعْجِلُونَ ("Taste your trial; this is what you sought to hasten") — and they said, when they were held back: يَا وَيْلَنَا هَذَا يَوْمُ الدِّينِ ("Woe to us, this is the Day of Judgement"), and Allah, blessed and exalted, said: هَذَا يَوْمُ الْفَصْلِ الَّذِي كُنْتُمْ بِهِ تُكَذِّبُونَ ("This is the Day of Decision which you used to deny").
Muḥammad ibn ʿAmr related to me, saying: Abū ʿĀṣim related to us, saying: ʿĪsā related to us; and al-Ḥārith related to me, saying: al-Ḥasan related to us, saying: Warqāʾ related to us — both — on the authority of Ibn Abī Najīḥ, on the authority of Mujāhid, concerning His words يُفْتَنُونَ ("being tried"), he said: as gold is tried in the fire.
Yaʿqūb related to me, saying: Hushaym related to me, saying: Ḥuṣayn informed us, on the authority of ʿIkrima, concerning His words يَوْمَ هُمْ عَلَى النَّارِ يُفْتَنُونَ ("on the Day when they are tried over the Fire"), he said: they are punished in the fire and burned in it; do you not see that when gold is cast into the fire, it is said that it is "tried" (futina)?
Sulaymān ibn ʿAbd al-Jabbār related to me, saying: Muḥammad ibn al-Ṣalt related to us, saying: Abū Kudayna related to us, on the authority of Ḥuṣayn, on the authority of ʿIkrima: يَوْمَ هُمْ عَلَى النَّارِ يُفْتَنُونَ ("on the Day when they are tried over the Fire"), he said: they are punished.
Yaḥyā ibn Ṭalḥa al-Yarbūʿī related to us, saying: Fuḍayl ibn ʿIyāḍ related to us, on the authority of Manṣūr, on the authority of Mujāhid: يَوْمَ هُمْ عَلَى النَّارِ يُفْتَنُونَ ("on the Day when they are tried over the Fire"), he says: they are scorched by the fire.
Ibn Ḥumayd related to us, saying: Mihrān related to us, on the authority of Sufyān, on the authority of al-Ḥuṣayn, on the authority of ʿIkrima: يَوْمَ هُمْ عَلَى النَّارِ يُفْتَنُونَ ("on the Day when they are tried over the Fire"), he said: they are burned.
Ibn Ḥumayd related to us, saying: Mihrān related to us, on the authority of Sufyān: يَوْمَ هُمْ عَلَى النَّارِ يُفْتَنُونَ ("on the Day when they are tried over the Fire"), he says: they are burned.
It was related to me on the authority of al-Ḥusayn, he said: I heard Abū Muʿādh say: ʿUbayd informed us, saying: I heard al-Ḍaḥḥāk say concerning يَوْمَ هُمْ عَلَى النَّارِ يُفْتَنُونَ ("on the Day when they are tried over the Fire"), he said: they are made to boil, as gold is tried by the fire.
Yūnus related to me, saying: Ibn Wahb informed us, saying: Ibn Zayd said concerning His words يَوْمَ هُمْ عَلَى النَّارِ يُفْتَنُونَ ("on the Day when they are tried over the Fire"), he said: they are burned by the fire.
Ibn Ḥumayd related to us, saying: Jarīr related to us, on the authority of Manṣūr, on the authority of Mujāhid: يَوْمَ هُمْ عَلَى النَّارِ يُفْتَنُونَ ("on the Day when they are tried over the Fire"), he said: they are burned.
And others said: no, what is meant by it is that they are denounced as liars.
* Mention of who said that:
It was related to me on the authority of al-Ḥusayn, he said: I heard Abū Muʿādh say: ʿUbayd informed us, saying: I heard al-Ḍaḥḥāk say concerning His words يَوْمَ هُمْ عَلَى النَّارِ يُفْتَنُونَ ("on the Day when they are tried over the Fire"), he says: they are made to boil; and it is also said that يُفْتَنُونَ means: they are charged with lying — all of this is said.
The Arabic linguists differed concerning the reason why "al-yawm" (the Day) stands in the accusative in His words يَوْمَ هُمْ عَلَى النَّارِ يُفْتَنُونَ . Some of the grammarians of Basra said: it stands in the accusative as an adverb of time, and the meaning of أَيَّانَ يَوْمُ الدِّينِ ("when is the Day of Judgement") is: when is the Day of Judgement? They were answered with يَوْمَ هُمْ عَلَى النَّارِ يُفْتَنُونَ , because that Day is a long day on which the Reckoning takes place and on which their trial over the fire occurs.
And some of the grammarians of Kufa said: "yawmahum" stands only in the accusative because you have added (annexed) it to two things; and when "al-yawm" and "al-layla" are annexed to a noun that has a verb [as predicate] and those two [subject and predicate] are in the nominative, then "al-yawm" comes in the accusative, even though it is in a position of genitive or nominative — namely when it is annexed to "faʿala" or "yafʿalu," or when it is so. Its nominative in a position of nominative […] and its genitive in a position of genitive is [likewise] permissible; so if one were to say يَوْمَ هُمْ عَلَى النَّارِ يُفْتَنُونَ with "yawmu" in the nominative, that would be a valid form, but none of the Qurʾān-reciters read it that way.
And another of them said: "yawma" in يَوْمَ هُمْ عَلَى النَّارِ يُفْتَنُونَ stands in the accusative because it is an impure (incomplete) annexation, and therefore it stands in the accusative, although the interpretation is nominative. And if one put it in the nominative, that would be permissible, for you say: "when is your day?" and you answer: "Thursday" or "Friday" [in the nominative], and the nominative is the [most correct] form, because it is a noun standing opposite a [another] noun — this, then, is the [proper] form.
And the most correct of the two views in the interpretation of His words يَوْمَ هُمْ عَلَى النَّارِ يُفْتَنُونَ ("on the Day when they are tried over the Fire") is the view of the one who said: they are punished by burning, because "al-fitna" originally means "testing" (al-ikhtibār). For one says "fatantu al-dhahab bi-l-nār" (I tried the gold with the fire) when you melt it to know its purity. So too with His words يَوْمَ هُمْ عَلَى النَّارِ يُفْتَنُونَ : they are burned by it as gold is burned by it. As for the accusative of "al-yawm": it is so because it is an impure annexation, according to what we have described from the words of the one who said that.
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Footnotes:
(2) Thus it is in the Maʿānī al-Qurʾān of al-Farrāʾ. In the original manuscript it reads: "wa-idhā qāla".
(3) Thus it is in the Maʿānī al-Qurʾān. In the original manuscript it reads: "yaqūlu: law qīla".
