Tafseer of The Heights · Al-A'raaf · 7:138
And We took the Children of Israel across the sea; then they came upon a people intent in devotion to [some] idols of theirs. They said, "O Moses, make for us a god just as they have gods." He said, "Indeed, you are a people behaving ignorantly.
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 discourse on the explanation of His statement: وَجَاوَزْنَا بِبَنِي إِسْرَائِيلَ الْبَحْرَ فَأَتَوْا عَلَى قَوْمٍ يَعْكُفُونَ عَلَى أَصْنَامٍ لَهُمْ قَالُوا يَا مُوسَى اجْعَلْ لَنَا إِلَهًا كَمَا لَهُمْ آلِهَةٌ قَالَ إِنَّكُمْ قَوْمٌ تَجْهَلُونَ ("And We brought the Children of Israel across the sea, and they came upon a people devoted to idols they had. They said: O Mūsā, make for us a god just as they have gods. He said: Truly, you are an ignorant people") (138)
Abū Jaʿfar said: He, exalted be His remembrance, says: And We brought the Children of Israel across the sea, after the signs We had shown them and the lessons they had witnessed with their own eyes through the hand of Allah's prophet Mūsā. Yet those signs did not restrain them, and those lessons and clear proofs did not admonish them! Until—despite having witnessed of the proofs that which makes it fitting to compare the dumb beasts to them—when they passed by a people devoted to idols they had, He says: who stood by images that they worshipped instead of Allah—[they said]: "Make for us," O Mūsā, "a god," He says: an image that we may worship and an idol that we may take as a god, just as this people has idols that they worship. But it is not proper to worship anything except Allah, the One, the All-Subduing. And Mūsā, the blessings of Allah be upon him, said: Truly you, O people, are a people ignorant of the greatness of Allah and of what His right over you makes obligatory, and you do not know that worship is not permissible for anything except Allah, to Whom belongs the dominion over the heavens and the earth.
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And concerning Ibn Jurayj the following is reported about this:
15053 - Al-Qāsim related to us, saying: al-Ḥusayn related to us, saying: Ḥajjāj related to me: (And We brought the Children of Israel across the sea, and they came upon a people devoted to idols they had), Ibn Jurayj said: "to idols they had," he said: images of cattle. And when the calf of al-Sāmirī appeared, it was presented to them as though it were of those cattle; that was the beginning of the affair of the calf: (They said: O Mūsā, make for us a god just as they have gods. He said: Truly, you are an ignorant people).
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And it has been said: The people devoted to idols they had, whom Allah has mentioned in this verse, were a people from [the tribe of] Lakhm.
* Mention of who said that:
15054 - Muḥammad ibn Bashshār related to us, saying: Bishr ibn ʿAmr related to us, saying: al-ʿAbbās ibn al-Mufaḍḍal related to us, on the authority of Abī al-ʿAwwām, on the authority of Qatāda: (and they came upon a people devoted to idols they had), he said: it was [the tribe of] Lakhm.
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And it has been said: They belonged to the Canaanites whom Mūsā, peace be upon him, was commanded to fight (qitāl). And indeed:
15055 - Muḥammad ibn ʿAbd al-Aʿlā related to us, saying: Muḥammad ibn Thawr related to us, on the authority of Maʿmar, on the authority of al-Zuhrī: that Abū Wāqid al-Laythī said: We set out with the Messenger of Allah ﷺ before [the battle of] Ḥunayn, and we passed by a lote-tree. I said: O prophet of Allah, make for us this [tree] a "dhāt anwāṭ" just as the unbelievers (kāfir) have a "dhāt anwāṭ"! And the unbelievers used to hang their weapons on a lote-tree and devote themselves around it—then the prophet ﷺ said: Allah is the Greatest! This is just as the Children of Israel said to Mūsā: "Make for us a god just as they have gods"; truly, you will follow the customs of those who were before you.
15056 - Al-Ḥasan ibn Yaḥyā related to us, saying: ʿAbd al-Razzāq informed us, saying: Maʿmar informed us, on the authority of al-Zuhrī, on the authority of Sinān ibn Abī Sinān, on the authority of Wāqid al-Laythī, he said: We set out with the Messenger of Allah ﷺ before Ḥunayn, and we passed by a lote-tree, and we said: O prophet of Allah, make for us this [tree] a "dhāt anwāṭ," and he mentioned something similar.
15057 - Al-Muthannā related to me, saying: al-Ḥajjāj related to us, saying: Ḥammād related to us, on the authority of Muḥammad ibn Isḥāq, on the authority of al-Zuhrī, on the authority of Sinān ibn Abī Sinān, on the authority of Abī Wāqid al-Laythī, on the authority of the Messenger of Allah ﷺ, something similar.
15058 - Al-Muthannā related to me, saying: Ibn Ṣāliḥ related to us, saying: al-Layth related to me, saying: ʿUqayl related to me, on the authority of Ibn Shihāb, he said: Sinān ibn Abī Sinān al-Dīlī informed me, on the authority of Abī Wāqid al-Laythī: that they set out from Mecca with the Messenger of Allah ﷺ for Ḥunayn. He said: And the unbelievers had a lote-tree at which they devoted themselves and on which they hung their weapons, called "dhāt anwāṭ." He said: We passed by a great, green lote-tree, and we said: O Messenger of Allah, make for us a "dhāt anwāṭ." He said: By Him in Whose hand is my soul, you have said what the people of Mūsā said: "Make for us a god just as they have gods. He said: Truly, you are an ignorant people." These are the customs; you will surely follow the customs of those who were before you.
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Footnotes:
(1) See the explanation of "al-ʿukūf" (devoting oneself) in what preceded 3:41, 539, 540. And "al-muthul" (with two ḍammas) is the plural of "mithāl" (with a kasra on the mīm), which is the figure/form, like "al-timthāl."
(2) The narration 15054—"Bishr ibn ʿAmr [ibn] al-Ḥakam ibn ʿUqba al-Zahrānī al-Azdī," from whom the Group [the six canonical collectors] narrate. Already mentioned under no. 3375. And "al-ʿAbbās ibn al-Mufaḍḍal," thus it stands in the manuscript and the printed edition, but I consider it more probable that it is "al-ʿAbbās ibn al-Faḍl al-Anṣārī al-Wāqifī," concerning whom there is a biography in al-Tahdhīb and in Ibn Abī Ḥātim 2/1/212, and he is someone whose narration is rejected. And "Abū al-ʿAwwām" is "ʿImrān ibn Dāwar al-Qaṭṭān," already mentioned under no. 7503.
(3) "Al-sidra," of which the singular is "sidra," is the tree of the nabq (jujube/lote-tree).
(4) "Nāṭa al-shayʾa yanūṭuhu nawṭan"—he hung the thing up. And "al-anwāṭ" is that which is hung upon a sedan-litter or something else, that is, the hangings.
(5) The narration 15055—the report of Abū Wāqid al-Laythī concerning "dhāt anwāṭ," which Abū Jaʿfar has transmitted by four ways; this is the first of them, and it is a mursal report, because al-Zuhrī did not ascribe it [with a complete chain]. Its takhrīj follows in what comes hereafter.
(6) The narration 15056—"Sinān ibn Abī Sinān al-Dīlī or al-Duʾalī al-Jadarī," a trustworthy tābiʿī. A biography of him is in al-Tahdhīb, and al-Kabīr 2/2/163, and Ibn Abī Ḥātim 2/1/252. And this report was transmitted by Aḥmad in his Musnad 5:218 by way of ʿAbd al-Razzāq, on the authority of Maʿmar, in a similar manner.
(7) The narration 15057—Ibn Isḥāq transmitted it in his Sīra 4:84, on the authority of "Abū Wāqid al-Laythī, al-Ḥārith ibn Mālik, he said: We set out with the Messenger of Allah ﷺ for Ḥunayn, and we had only shortly before come out of unbelief." And in the Ḥalabī printing it reads "that al-Ḥārith ibn Mālik," with the addition of "that," which is a corrupt addition that does not occur in the remaining manuscripts.
(8) The narration 15058—"Ibn Ṣāliḥ" is "ʿAbd Allāh ibn Ṣāliḥ al-Juhanī al-Miṣrī," "Abū Ṣāliḥ," the scribe of al-Layth ibn Saʿd. And in the printed edition and the manuscript [Al-Muthannā related to me, saying] has dropped out, and Abū Jaʿfar did not [personally] meet Abū Ṣāliḥ, but he narrates from him only by way of "al-Muthannā," as has already become clear in the isnād that is current in the tafsīr, and the nearest of these is: 15050: "Al-Muthannā related to us, saying: ʿAbd Allāh ibn Ṣāliḥ related to us." And al-Bukhārī, as you will see, transmitted it directly from Abū Ṣāliḥ; therefore it is established that there has dropped out of the isnād: [Al-Muthannā related to me], and I have added it; see something similar in what preceded: 2350. And al-Layth is "al-Layth ibn Saʿd" the imam. And "ʿUqayl" is "ʿUqayl ibn Khālid al-Aylī," already mentioned under nos. 19, 2350, trustworthy, firmly established, an authoritative proof. And this report was transmitted by Aḥmad by way of Ḥajjāj, on the authority of Layth ibn Saʿd, in a similar manner, and al-Bukhārī transmitted it in abridged form in his Taʾrīkh 2/2/164, saying: "And Abū Ṣāliḥ related to us: al-Layth related to me, ʿUqayl related to me, on the authority of Ibn Shihāb, Sinān ibn Abī Sinān al-Duʾalī, then al-Jadarī, informed me, on the authority of Abū Wāqid al-Laythī, who heard the prophet ﷺ [say]: you will surely follow the customs of those who were before you." And Aḥmad added in his Musnad another way for the report of Abū Wāqid, the way of Mālik ibn Anas, on the authority of al-Zuhrī, on the authority of Sinān ibn Abī Sinān (al-Musnad no. 5:218). And Abū Dāwūd al-Ṭayālisī transmitted it in his Musnad: 191 by way of Ibrāhīm ibn Saʿd al-Zuhrī, on the authority of [al-Zuhrī], on the authority of Sinān ibn Abī Sinān, in a similar manner. And in the Musnad [al-Zuhrī] has dropped out. And al-Suyūṭī included it in al-Durr al-Manthūr 3:114, and added the attribution to Ibn Abī Shayba, al-Nasāʾī, Ibn al-Mundhir, Ibn Abī Ḥātim, Abū al-Shaykh, and Ibn Mardawayh. And "al-sunan" (with two fatḥas): the direction of the way.
