Tafseer of The Spoils of War · Al-Anfaal · 8:66
Now, Allah has lightened [the hardship] for you, and He knows that among you is weakness. So if there are from you one hundred [who are] steadfast, they will overcome two hundred. And if there are among you a thousand, they will overcome two thousand by permission of Allah. And Allah is with the steadfast.
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.
(24) Then He — exalted is His mention — made it easy for the believers, when He knew their weakness, and said to them: الآن خفف الله عنكم وعلم أن فيكم ضعفا (Now Allah has lightened it for you, and He knows that there is weakness in you), that is to say: that in each of them there is a weakness in the face of confronting ten of their enemy = فإن يكن منكم مئة صابرة (so if there be among you a hundred steadfast ones), upon confronting them, to hold firm = يغلبوا مئتين (they will overcome two hundred) of them = وإن يكن منكم ألف يغلبوا ألفين (and if there be among you a thousand, they will overcome two thousand) of them = بإذن الله (by the permission of Allah), that is to say: by Allah's clearing the way for them to overcome them, and by His granting them aid (25) = والله مع الصابرين (and Allah is with the steadfast), against their enemy and the enemy of Allah, in their steadfastness for the sake of the reward, and in seeking the abundant recompense of their Lord, through His aid to him and the victory over him.
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And in accordance with what we have said about that, the people of interpretation have spoken.
* Mention of who said that:
16269 - Muḥammad ibn Bashshār related to us, he said: Muḥammad ibn Muḥabbib related to us, he said: Sufyān related to us, on the authority of Layth, on the authority of ʿAṭāʾ concerning His statement: if there be among you twenty steadfast ones, they will overcome two hundred, he said: the one [Muslim] stood against ten, then the one was set against two; it does not befit him to flee from those two (26).
16270 - Saʿīd ibn Yaḥyā related to us, he said: my father related to us, he said: Ibn Jurayj related to us, on the authority of ʿAmr ibn Dīnār, on the authority of Ibn ʿAbbās, he said: It was imposed upon the Muslims that upon every man rested ten of the unbelievers, and He said: if there be among you twenty steadfast ones, they will overcome two hundred, then He made that easy for them, and set upon every man two men. Ibn ʿAbbās said: I would not like the people to know that lightening for them.
16271 - Ibn Ḥumayd related to us, he said: Salama related to us, he said: Muḥammad ibn Isḥāq said: ʿAbd Allāh ibn Abī Najīḥ al-Makkī related to me, on the authority of ʿAṭāʾ ibn Abī Rabāḥ, on the authority of ʿAbd Allāh ibn ʿAbbās, he said: When this verse was revealed, it weighed heavily upon the Muslims, and they found it overwhelming that twenty should fight against two hundred, and a hundred against a thousand, and Allah made it easy for them. He abrogated it with the other verse and said: Now Allah has lightened it for you, and He knows that there is weakness in you; if there be among you a hundred steadfast ones, they will overcome two hundred, and if there be among you a thousand, they will overcome two thousand. He said: and when they were equal to half of their enemy, it did not befit them to flee from them. And when they were fewer than that, it was not obligatory upon them to fight, and it was permitted to them to withdraw from them (27).
16272 - Al-Muthannā related to me, he said: ʿAbd Allāh ibn Ṣāliḥ related to us, he said: Muʿāwiya related to me, on the authority of ʿAlī, on the authority of Ibn ʿAbbās concerning His statement: if there be among you twenty steadfast ones, they will overcome two hundred, he said: Upon every man of the Muslims rested ten, and it did not befit him to flee from them. Thus they remained, until Allah revealed: Now Allah has lightened it for you, and He knows that there is weakness in you; if there be among you a hundred steadfast ones, they will overcome two hundred, and He set against every man of the Muslims two men of the polytheists (mushrikīn), and thus He abrogated the first command = And he said another time concerning His statement: if there be among you twenty steadfast ones, they will overcome two hundred: Allah commanded the man among the believers to fight ten of the unbelievers, and that weighed heavily upon the believers, and Allah had mercy upon them and said: if there be among you a hundred steadfast ones, they will overcome two hundred, and if there be among you a thousand, they will overcome two thousand by the permission of Allah, and Allah is with the steadfast, and Allah commanded the man among the believers to fight two men of the unbelievers.
16273 - Muḥammad ibn Saʿd related to me, he said: my father related to me, he said: my uncle related to me, he said: my father related to me, on the authority of his father, on the authority of Ibn ʿAbbās concerning His statement: يا أيها النبي حرض المؤمنين على القتال (O Prophet, urge the believers to fight), up to His statement: بأنهم قوم لا يفقهون (because they are a people who do not understand): and that is because He had set upon every man of the Muslims ten of the enemy with which He incited them = that is to say: spurred them on (28) = thereby, so that they would prepare themselves for war, and [so that they would know] that Allah is their helper against the enemy. It was not a matter that Allah had imposed upon them as a duty nor made obligatory, but it was an urging and a recommendation that Allah had commanded His prophet. Then He made it easy for them and said: Now Allah has lightened it for you, and He knows that there is weakness in you, and He thereafter set upon every man two men, as a lightening, so that the believers would know that Allah is merciful to them. Thus they placed their trust in Allah, and were steadfast and sincere. And had it been obligatory upon them, then thereby every man of the Muslims who [shrank back] from whom he met of the unbelievers when they were more numerous than them and he did not fight them, would have become an unbeliever (29). So let not the statement of certain men deceive you! For I have heard men saying: it is not proper for a man of the Muslims to fight until upon every man rest two men [of the enemy], and until upon every two men rest four, and so in proportion; and they claimed that they disobey Allah if they fight before they reach that number, and that there is no blame upon them for not fighting until they reach the number at which two men rest upon every man and four upon every two men. But Allah has said: وَمِنَ النَّاسِ مَنْ يَشْرِي نَفْسَهُ ابْتِغَاءَ مَرْضَاةِ اللَّهِ وَاللَّهُ رَءُوفٌ بِالْعِبَادِ (And among the people is he who sells himself seeking the pleasure of Allah, and Allah is gracious to the servants) [Surah Al-Baqarah: 207], and Allah has said: فَقَاتِلْ فِي سَبِيلِ اللَّهِ لا تُكَلَّفُ إِلا نَفْسَكَ وَحَرِّضِ الْمُؤْمِنِينَ (So fight in the way of Allah; you are not held responsible except for yourself, and urge on the believers) [Surah Al-Nisāʾ: 84]. That, then, is the urging that Allah revealed to them in "Al-Anfāl". So do not be incapable, fight! For you have fallen amidst people just as Allah has willed that they should be (30).
16274 - Ibn Ḥumayd related to us, he said: Yaḥyā ibn Wāḍiḥ related to us, on the authority of al-Ḥuṣayn, on the authority of Zayd, on the authority of ʿIkrima and al-Ḥasan, both of them said: He said in "Surah Al-Anfāl" = if there be among you twenty steadfast ones, they will overcome two hundred, and if there be among you a hundred, they will overcome a thousand of those who disbelieve, because they are a people who do not understand, then He abrogated it and said: Now Allah has lightened it for you, and He knows that there is weakness in you, up to His statement: and Allah is with the steadfast.
16275 - Ibn Ḥumayd related to us, he said: Jarīr related to us, on the authority of Mughīra, on the authority of ʿIkrima concerning His statement: if there be among you twenty steadfast ones, he said: one of the Muslims against ten of the polytheists (mushrikīn). Then He made it easy for them and imposed upon them that the one man did not flee from two men.
16276 - Muḥammad ibn ʿAmr related to me, he said: Abū ʿĀṣim related to us, he said: ʿĪsā related to us, on the authority of Ibn Abī Najīḥ, on the authority of Mujāhid concerning His statement: if there be among you twenty steadfast ones, up to His statement: and if there be among you a hundred, he said: this applied to the companions of Muḥammad, Allah's blessing and peace be upon him, on the day of Badr; upon every man of them were set ten of the unbelievers (31), and they complained about that, and so upon every man was set the fighting of two men, as a lightening from Allah.
16277 - Aḥmad ibn Isḥāq related to us, he said: Abū Aḥmad related to us, he said: Ibrāhīm ibn Yazīd related to us, on the authority of ʿAmr ibn Dīnār and Abū Maʿbad, on the authority of Ibn ʿAbbās, he said: The man was only commanded to make himself steadfast against ten, and the ten against a hundred, when the Muslims were few. But when the Muslims became numerous, Allah made it easy for them. Thus the man was commanded to be steadfast against two men, and the ten against twenty, and the hundred against two hundred.
16278 - Muḥammad ibn ʿAbd al-Aʿlā related to us, he said: Muḥammad ibn Thawr related to us, on the authority of Maʿmar, on the authority of Ibn Abī Najīḥ: if there be among you twenty steadfast ones, they will overcome two hundred, he said: It was obligatory upon them that, when twenty met two hundred, they did not flee, for if they did not flee they would overcome. Then Allah made it easy for them and said: if there be among you a hundred steadfast ones, they will overcome two hundred, and if there be among you a thousand, they will overcome two thousand, and He says: it is not proper that a thousand flee from two thousand, for if they are steadfast against them, they will overcome them.
16279 - Bishr related to us, he said: Yazīd related to us, he said: Saʿīd related to us, on the authority of Qatāda concerning His statement: Now Allah has lightened it for you, and He knows that there is weakness in you; if there be among you a hundred steadfast ones, they will overcome two hundred, and if there be among you a thousand, they will overcome two thousand: Allah set upon every man two men, after ten had rested upon every man = and this report is on the authority of Ibn ʿAbbās.
16280 - Ibn Wakīʿ related to us, he said: Yazīd ibn Hārūn related to us, on the authority of Jarīr ibn Ḥāzim, on the authority of al-Zubayr ibn al-Khirrīt, on the authority of ʿIkrima, on the authority of Ibn ʿAbbās: It was imposed upon the believers that the man among them fought ten of the polytheists (mushrikīn). His statement: if there be among you twenty steadfast ones, they will overcome two hundred, and if there be among you a hundred, they will overcome a thousand, that weighed heavily upon them, and Allah revealed the lightening, and set upon the man that he fought two men: His statement: if there be among you a hundred steadfast ones, they will overcome two hundred, and thus Allah made it easy for them, and they were reduced in steadfastness proportionally (32).
16281 - Muḥammad ibn al-Ḥusayn related to me, he said: Aḥmad ibn al-Mufaḍḍal related to us, he said: Asbāṭ related to us, on the authority of al-Suddī: if there be among you twenty steadfast ones, they will overcome two hundred, He says: they will fight two hundred, but they were weaker than that, and so Allah lifted it from them. He made it easy and said: if there be among you a hundred steadfast ones, they will overcome two hundred; thus the first time He set the man against ten, then He set the man against two.
16282 - Al-Ḥasan ibn Yaḥyā related to us, he said: ʿAbd al-Razzāq informed us, he said: Maʿmar informed us, on the authority of Ibn Abī Najīḥ, on the authority of Mujāhid concerning His statement: if there be among you twenty steadfast ones, they will overcome two hundred, he said: It was obligatory upon them that, when twenty met two hundred, they did not flee, for if they did not flee they would overcome. Then Allah made it easy for them and said: if there be among you a hundred steadfast ones, they will overcome two hundred, and if there be among you a thousand, they will overcome two thousand by the permission of Allah, and He says: it is not proper that a thousand flee from two thousand, for if they are steadfast against them, they will overcome them.
16283 - Al-Ḥasan related to us, he said: ʿAbd al-Razzāq informed us, he said: al-Thawrī informed us, on the authority of Juwaybir, on the authority of al-Ḍaḥḥāk, he said: This was obligatory, that not one flee from ten.
16284 - And through the same [chain of transmission] he said: al-Thawrī informed us, on the authority of Layth, on the authority of ʿAṭāʾ, the same as that.
* * *
As for His statement: because they are a people who do not understand, we have already set forth its interpretation (33).
* * *
And Ibn Isḥāq used to say about that what:-
16285 - Ibn Ḥumayd related to us, he said: Salama related to us, on the authority of Ibn Isḥāq: because they are a people who do not understand, that is to say: they do not fight out of a [pure] intention nor for any truth in it, and they have no knowledge of good nor evil (34).
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Abū Jaʿfar said: And this verse = I mean His statement: if there be among you twenty steadfast ones, they will overcome two hundred = even though it has the form of a statement, its meaning is a command. This is indicated by His statement: Now Allah has lightened it for you, for the lightening came only after the burdening. And had the holding firm of ten of them against a hundred of their enemy not been a duty upon them before the lightening, but merely a recommendation (nadb), then there would be no ground for the lightening, because the lightening is only a dispensation (rukhṣa) in the abandonment by the single Muslim of holding firm against the ten of the enemy. And when the burdening had not preceded it, then there would be no ground for the dispensation, since what is understood by a dispensation comes only after the burdening. And when that is so, then it is known that the ruling of His statement: Now Allah has lightened it for you, and He knows that there is weakness in you abrogates (nāsikh) the ruling of His statement: if there be among you twenty steadfast ones, they will overcome two hundred, and if there be among you a hundred, they will overcome a thousand of those who disbelieve. And we have set forth in our book "al-Bayān ʿan uṣūl al-aḥkām" (35) that every statement of Allah in which He has promised His servants reward and recompense for a deed, and for omitting it punishment and torment, even though its outward form does not have the form of a command, is nonetheless in the meaning of a command = with an exposition that relieves us of repeating it in this place.
* * *
The reciters have differed in the reading of His statement: and He knows that there is weakness in you.
Some of the Medinans and some of the Basrans read it: wa-ʿalima anna fīkum ḍuʿfan, with ḍamma on the "ḍād" throughout the whole Qurʾān, and tanwīn on "al-ḍuʿf" as a verbal noun (maṣdar) of: "ḍaʿufa al-rajulu ḍuʿfan".
* * *
Most of the reciters of the Kufans read it: wa-ʿalima anna fīkum ḍaʿfan, with fatḥa on the "ḍād", likewise as a verbal noun (maṣdar) of "ḍaʿufa".
* * *
And some of the Medinans read it: ḍuʿafāʾ, on the pattern "fuʿalāʾ", as a plural of "ḍaʿīf" on the pattern "ḍuʿafāʾ", just as "al-sharīk" is pluralized to "shurakāʾ" and "al-raḥīm" to "ruḥamāʾ".
* * *
Abū Jaʿfar said: And the most correct of the readings therein is the reading of him who read it: wa-ʿalima anna fīkum ḍaʿfan and ḍuʿfan, with fatḥa on the ḍād or with ḍamma upon it, because those are the two well-known readings, and they are two renowned eloquent dialects in the language of the Arabs with one and the same meaning; so with whichever of the two the reciter recites, he hits upon what is correct.
* * *
As for the reading of him who read that: "ḍuʿafāʾ", that is an anomalous (shādhdha) reading among the readings of the reciters, and even though it has a correct basis, I do not recommend a reciter to recite with it.
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Footnotes:
(24) See the explanation of "faqiha" in what has already preceded, 13: 278, note 1, and the references there.
(25) See the explanation of "al-idhn" in what has already preceded, 11: 215, note 2, and the references there.
(26) The report 16269 - "Muḥammad ibn Muḥabbib ibn Isḥāq al-Qurashī", trustworthy (thiqa), already preceded under number 6320.
(27) The report 16271 - Sīrat Ibn Hishām 2: 331, and it is a continuation of the following report number 16285; al-Ṭabarī has here placed earlier and later out of order, so that the order of his borrowing from the tafsīr of Ibn Isḥāq in his Sīra differs.
(28) "Al-taʾshīb" is the inciting between people through evil, and likewise "al-taʾshīb" in the meaning of urging on against the enemy; see as has already preceded in the note at number 16059, part 13: 531, note number 2, and the dictionaries fall short in explaining this expression in Arabic.
(29) In the printed edition it reads: "wa-law kāna ʿalayhim wājiban al-ghazwu idhā baʿuda kullu rajulin min al-muslimīna ʿamman laqiya min al-kuffār", which are words without meaning. And in the manuscript it read: "wa-law kāna ʿalayhim wājiban kafarū idhā kullu rajulin min al-muslimīna ʿamman laqiya min al-kuffār", and the correct form of the sentence is what has been established, but the copyist — and Allah knows best — omitted [nakala] which is placed between brackets. And "nakala ʿan ʿaduwwihi" means: he shrank back.
(30) In the printed edition it reads: "fa-lā yuʿjizuka qāʾilun qad saqaṭta" (let no speaker weaken you, you have fallen), which is without meaning; the correct one is what is in the manuscript as I have established it, and it is therein without diacritical points, and this is the correct reading. And his statement: "fa-lā taʿjizanna" means: do not sit idle out of incapacity from the fight, but fight, for you have fallen amidst a number of the enemy, just as Allah has willed that their number should be, whether they were few or many.
(31) In the printed edition "qitāl" (fighting) has been omitted in both places, because it stands in the manuscript as: "fa-qāla" (and he said), and its correct reading is what has been established.
(32) In the printed edition it reads: "wa-nuqiṣū min al-ṣabr" (and they were reduced in steadfastness), where a "wāw" has been added and "al-naṣr" has been altered, whereby the text was corrupted. May Allah forgive him.
(33) See what has already preceded, p. 51.
(34) The report 16285 - Sīrat Ibn Hishām 2: 331, and it is a continuation of the preceding report number 16257, and Abū Jaʿfar has moved it from its [original] place to this place, and placed report number 16271 before it, while in the interpretation of the Surah in the Sīra of Ibn Hishām it follows it. In the printed edition it read: "wa-lā maʿrifata li-khayrin", and I have established what is in the manuscript and the Sīra.
(35) In the printed edition it reads: "kitāb Laṭīf al-bayān", and I have established what is in the manuscript, and the book is one and the same.
