Tafseer of The Cattle · Al-An'aam · 6:44
So when they forgot that by which they had been reminded, We opened to them the doors of every [good] thing until, when they rejoiced in that which they were given, We seized them suddenly, and they were [then] in despair.
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: فَلَمَّا نَسُوا مَا ذُكِّرُوا بِهِ فَتَحْنَا عَلَيْهِمْ أَبْوَابَ كُلِّ شَيْءٍ حَتَّى إِذَا فَرِحُوا بِمَا أُوتُوا أَخَذْنَاهُمْ بَغْتَةً فَإِذَا هُمْ مُبْلِسُونَ (44) ("So when they forgot that whereof they had been reminded, We opened for them the gates of all things, until, when they rejoiced in what they had been given, We seized them suddenly, and behold, they were in despair.")
Abū Jaʿfar said: The Exalted, whose mention is exalted, means by His word "So when they forgot that whereof they had been reminded": when they abandoned acting in accordance with what We had commanded them through the mouths of Our messengers, as in the following:
13226 — Al-Muthannā related to us, saying: ʿAbd Allāh ibn Ṣāliḥ related to us, saying: Muʿāwiya ibn Ṣāliḥ related to me, on the authority of ʿAlī ibn Abī Ṭalḥa, on the authority of Ibn ʿAbbās, concerning His word: "So when they forgot that whereof they had been reminded," that is to say: they neglected that whereof they had been reminded.
13227 — Al-Qāsim related to us, saying: Al-Ḥusayn related to us, saying: Ḥajjāj related to me, on the authority of Ibn Jurayj, concerning His word: "they forgot that whereof they had been reminded," he said: that to which Allah and His messengers called them, that they refused and cast back upon them.
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= "We opened for them the gates of all things," He says: We exchanged, in place of adversity, prosperity and ampleness in livelihood, and in place of calamity, health and well-being in the bodies and persons — as a gradual enticement (istidrāj) on Our part toward them, as in the following:
13228 — Mohammed ibn ʿAmr related to me, saying: Abū ʿĀṣim related to us, saying: ʿĪsā related to me = and al-Muthannā related to me, saying: Abū Ḥudhayfa related to us, saying: Shibl related to us = on the authority of Ibn Abī Najīḥ, on the authority of Mujāhid, concerning the word of Allah, the Exalted, whose mention is exalted: "We opened for them the gates of all things," he said: the prosperity of the worldly life and its ease, for the earlier generations.
13229 — Al-Ḥasan ibn Yaḥyā related to us, saying: ʿAbd al-Razzāq informed us, saying: Maʿmar informed us, on the authority of Qatāda, concerning His word: "We opened for them the gates of all things," he said: thereby is meant prosperity and ampleness in livelihood.
13230 — Mohammed ibn al-Ḥusayn related to me, saying: Aḥmad ibn Mufaḍḍal related to us, saying: Asbāṭ related to us, on the authority of al-Suddī, concerning His word: "We opened for them the gates of all things," He says: of livelihood.
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Now if someone were to say to us: How can it be said "We opened for them the gates of all things," while you know that the gate of mercy and the gate of repentance [were not opened for them], and that many other gates besides these two were not opened for them?
Then it is answered: Indeed, the meaning of that is other than the manner in which you have understood it; the meaning of that is only: We opened for them, as a gradual enticement on Our part toward them, the gates of all that whose gate We had closed against them when We seized them with adversity and calamity so that they might supplicate in humility — when they did not supplicate in humility and abandoned the command of Allah, the Exalted, whose mention is exalted. For the last of these expressions is referred back to the first of them. And that is as the Exalted, whose mention is exalted, said in another place in His Book: وَمَا أَرْسَلْنَا فِي قَرْيَةٍ مِنْ نَبِيٍّ إِلا أَخَذْنَا أَهْلَهَا بِالْبَأْسَاءِ وَالضَّرَّاءِ لَعَلَّهُمْ يَضَّرَّعُونَ * ثُمَّ بَدَّلْنَا مَكَانَ السَّيِّئَةِ الْحَسَنَةَ حَتَّى عَفَوْا وَقَالُوا قَدْ مَسَّ آبَاءَنَا الضَّرَّاءُ وَالسَّرَّاءُ فَأَخَذْنَاهُمْ بَغْتَةً وَهُمْ لا يَشْعُرُونَ [Sūrat al-Aʿrāf: 94-95] ("And We sent no prophet into any town but that We seized its inhabitants with adversity and calamity, so that they might supplicate in humility. Then We exchanged, in place of the evil, the good, until they increased in number and said: Adversity and prosperity touched our forefathers also. Then We seized them suddenly, while they were unaware"). Thus did Allah open for the people mentioned in this verse — [who forgot that whereof] He had reminded them, by His word: "So when they forgot that whereof they had been reminded, We opened for them the gates of all things" — that is His substitution for them, in place of the evil in which they had been at the time of His testing them, from the straitness of existence to prosperity and ampleness, and from bodily hardship to health and well-being; and that is "the opening of the gates of all things" whose gate had been closed against them, of that which was mentioned before His word "We opened for them the gates of all things." Thus His word "We opened for them the gates of all things" was referred back to that.
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And the Exalted means by His word "until, when they rejoiced in what they had been given," He says: until these who belied their messengers rejoiced over Our opening for them of the gates of ampleness in livelihood and health in the bodies, as in the following:
13231 — Mohammed ibn al-Ḥusayn related to me, saying: Aḥmad ibn al-Mufaḍḍal related to us, saying: Asbāṭ related to us, on the authority of al-Suddī: "until, when they rejoiced in what they had been given," of livelihood.
13232 — Al-Ḥārith related to us, saying: Al-Qāsim ibn Sallām related to us, saying: I heard ʿAbd al-Raḥmān ibn Mahdī relate, on the authority of Ḥammād ibn Zayd, who said: There was a man who used to say: May Allah have mercy on a man who recites this verse and then ponders over what is meant by it: "until, when they rejoiced in what they had been given, We seized them suddenly."
13233 — Al-Ḥārith related to me, saying: Al-Qāsim related to us, saying: Ibn Abī Rajāʾ, a man from the people of poetry, related to us, on the authority of ʿAbd Allāh ibn al-Mubārak, on the authority of Mohammed ibn al-Naḍr al-Ḥārithī, concerning His word: "We seized them suddenly," he said: they were granted a respite of twenty years.
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And the Exalted, whose mention is exalted, means by His word "We seized them suddenly": We brought upon them the punishment unawares, while they were blinded and did not realize that this would take place, nor that it would befall them, as in the following:
13234 — Al-Qāsim related to us, saying: Al-Ḥusayn related to us, saying: Ḥajjāj related to me, on the authority of Ibn Jurayj: "until, when they rejoiced in what they had been given, We seized them suddenly," he said: in the most pleasing state in which they were, and the most deceptive for them.
13235 — Mohammed ibn al-Ḥusayn related to us, saying: Aḥmad ibn al-Mufaḍḍal related to us, saying: Asbāṭ related to us, on the authority of al-Suddī: "We seized them suddenly," He says: the punishment seized them suddenly.
13236 — Mohammed ibn ʿAmr related to me, saying: Abū ʿĀṣim related to us, saying: ʿĪsā related to us, on the authority of Ibn Abī Najīḥ, on the authority of Mujāhid: "We seized them suddenly," he said: unawares, while they deemed themselves secure.
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As for His word "and behold, they were in despair": they are then doomed to perdition, their proofs cut off, full of regret over what preceded on their part of their belying of their messengers, as in the following:
13237 — Mohammed ibn al-Ḥusayn related to me, saying: Aḥmad ibn al-Mufaḍḍal related to us, saying: Asbāṭ related to us, on the authority of al-Suddī: "and behold, they were in despair," he said: and behold, they are doomed to perdition, their state changed.
13238 — Al-Ḥārith related to me, saying: ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz related to us, saying: a sheikh related to us, on the authority of Mujāhid: "and behold, they were in despair," he said: dejection.
13239 — Yūnus related to me, saying: Ibn Wahb informed us, saying: Ibn Zayd said concerning His word: "and behold, they were in despair," he said: "the one in despair" (al-mublis) is he upon whom an evil has descended that he cannot ward off. And the one in despair is in a graver state than the one who submits resignedly (al-mustakīn); and he recited: فَمَا اسْتَكَانُوا لِرَبِّهِمْ وَمَا يَتَضَرَّعُونَ [Sūrat al-Muʾminūn: 76] ("And they did not submit to their Lord, nor did they supplicate in humility"). And in the beginning there was still admonition and a remainder of respite. And he recited the word of Allah: "We seized them with adversity and calamity, so that they might supplicate in humility" = فَلَوْلا إِذْ جَاءَهُمْ بَأْسُنَا تَضَرَّعُوا ("Why then did they not supplicate in humility when Our might came upon them?") until he reached وَزَيَّنَ لَهُمُ الشَّيْطَانُ مَا كَانُوا يَعْمَلُونَ ("and Satan made fair-seeming to them what they used to do"); then there came a command in which there was no longer any remainder of respite. And he recited: "until, when they rejoiced in what they had been given, We seized them suddenly, and behold, they were in despair," thus there came a command in which there was no longer any remainder of respite. And in the first case it held: had they supplicated in humility, it would have been removed from them.
13240 — Saʿīd ibn ʿAmr al-Sakūnī related to me, saying: Baqiyya ibn al-Walīd related to us, on the authority of Abū Shurayḥ Ḍubāra ibn Mālik, on the authority of Abū al-Ṣalt, on the authority of Ḥarmala Abū ʿAbd al-Raḥmān, on the authority of ʿUqba ibn Muslim, on the authority of ʿUqba ibn ʿĀmir, who said: The Messenger of Allah ﷺ said: When you see that Allah gives His servant in his worldly life, then that is only a gradual enticement (istidrāj). Then he recited this verse: "So when they forgot that whereof they had been reminded" up to His word: وَالْحَمْدُ لِلَّهِ رَبِّ الْعَالَمِينَ ("and all praise is due to Allah, the Lord of the worlds").
13241 — And this report was related to me on the authority of Mohammed ibn Ḥarb, on the authority of Ibn Lahīʿa, on the authority of ʿUqba ibn Muslim, on the authority of ʿUqba ibn ʿĀmir: that the Prophet ﷺ said: And when you see that Allah, the Exalted, whose mention is exalted, gives the servants what they ask, despite their disobedience toward Him, then that is only a gradual enticement from Him toward them! Then he recited: "So when they forgot that whereof they had been reminded, We opened for them the gates of all things" — the verse.
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And the origin of "al-iblās" (despair) in the language of the Arabs is, according to some: grief over something and regret over it = and according to some: being cut off from the proof and falling silent at being cut off from the proof = and according to some: humility = and they said: it is the one forsaken, the one abandoned; and of this is the saying of al-ʿAjjāj:
"O friend, do you still recognize an effaced remnant of an abandoned dwelling?
He said: Yes! I recognize it! And he was struck with despair (ablasa)."
The explanation of his word "ablasa" is, according to those who claimed that "al-iblās" means being cut off from the proof and falling silent thereat, in the sense of: that he could give no answer.
And the others explained it in the sense of humility, and of the abandonment of the dwelling by its inhabitants while he remained dwelling there.
And the others in the sense of grief and regret.
One says of this: "ablasa al-rajulu iblāsan" (the man fell into despair), and of this "Iblīs" is named "Iblīs."
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