Tafseer of The Star · An-Najm · 53:21
Is the male for you and for Him the female?
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 statement أَلَكُمُ الذَّكَرُ وَلَهُ الأنْثَى ("Is the male for you and the female for Him?"). He says: Do you claim that the male, which pleases you, is for you, and that the female, which you do not find pleasing for yourselves, is for Allah? تِلْكَ إِذًا قِسْمَةٌ ضِيزَى ("That, then, would be an unfair division"). The Exalted, whose praise is exalted, says: This division of yours is an unjust, unequal division, defective and incomplete, for you have assigned to your Lord as offspring that which you loathe for yourselves, while you have privileged yourselves with that which pleases you.
The Arabs say: "ḍiztu-hu ḥaqqahu" with a kasra on the ḍād, and also "ḍuztu-hu" with a ḍamma; one then says "aḍīzuhu" and "aḍūzuhu". That is when one deprives someone of his right and withholds it from him. It has been related to me on the authority of Maʿmar ibn al-Muthannā, who said: Al-Akhfash recited to me:
"And if you withdraw from us, we will hold you in contempt; and if you are absent, then your arrow is shortchanged (maḍʾūz) and your nose is pressed into the dust." (5)
Some of the Arabs also say "ḍayzā" with a fatḥa on the ḍād and without hamza; and some say "ḍaʾzā" with a fatḥa and hamza, and "ḍuʾzā" with a ḍamma and hamza. But no one has recited according to any of these dialectal forms. As for "al-ḍīzā" with a kasra: it is the pattern "fuʿlā" with a ḍamma on the fāʾ, but its ḍād was pronounced with a kasra, just as they also placed a kasra in their expression "qawmun bīḍ" and "ʿīn", which have [the pattern] "fuʿl", because their singular is "bayḍāʾ" and "ʿaynāʾ", so that they brought the plural, the dual, and the singular into agreement. Likewise, they found objectionable the ḍamma on the ḍād of "ḍīzā", such that you would [otherwise] say "ḍūzā", out of fear that the [word] would be formed with a wāw while it derives from the yāʾ.
Al-Farrāʾ said: I have judged that its beginning originally has a ḍamma, because the adjectives (nuʿūt) for the feminine come either with a fatḥa or with a ḍamma. Those formed with fatḥa are: "sakrā" (drunk) and "ʿaṭshā" (thirsty); and those formed with ḍamma are: "al-unthā" (the female) and "al-ḥublā" (the pregnant one). And when it is a noun that is not an adjective, then its beginning is pronounced with a kasra, as in His statement وَذَكِّرْ فَإِنَّ الذِّكْرَى تَنْفَعُ الْمُؤْمِنِينَ ("And remind, for the reminder benefits the believers") — its beginning ["al-dhikrā"] was pronounced with a kasra, because it is a noun that is not an adjective. So too "al-shiʿrā" [the star Sirius]: its beginning was pronounced with a kasra, because it is a noun that is not an adjective.
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The footnotes:
(5) The transmission of the verse reads in "al-Lisān", under the lemma "ḍaʾaza": "wa-in taqum" ("and if you stand up") instead of "wa-in taghib" ("and if you are absent"). Ibn al-Aʿrābī said: The Arabs say "qismatun ḍuʾzā" with ḍamma and hamza; "ḍūzā" with ḍamma without hamza; "ḍiʾzī" with kasra and hamza; and "ḍīzī" with kasra without hamza. He said: and the meaning of all these forms is injustice (jawr). In "al-Lisān", under the lemma "ḍyz": "ḍāza fī al-ḥukm" means: he was unjust in the judgment. "Ḍāzahu ḥaqqahu yaḍīzuhu ḍayzan": he diminished, harmed, and withheld it from him. "Ḍiztu fulānan aḍīzuhu ḍayzan": I committed injustice against him. "Ḍāza yaḍīzu": when he acted unjustly. Sometimes it is formed with hamza, so that one says: "ḍaʾazahu yaḍʾazuhu ḍaʾzan". And in the Exalted Revelation: تلك إذا قسمة ضيزى — "qismatun ḍīzā" and "ḍūzā" means: unjust. The author has taken over al-Farrāʾ's statement in its entirety in "Maʿānī al-Qurʾān" (folio 316), so we suffice with a reference to it. Al-Qurṭubī excellently summarized the statement of the grammarians concerning "ḍīzā" in (17:103); consult it there.
