9. At-Tawba

And the believers both men and women are allies of one another; they enjoin decency and forbid indecency; they observe prayer and pay the alms and they obey God and His Messenger. Those God will have mercy on them. Truly God is Mighty nothing can prevent Him from fulfilling His promise and His threat; Wise He puts everything in its proper place.

God has promised the believers both men and women Gardens underneath which rivers flow to abide therein and blessed dwellings in the Gardens of Eden for residence and beatitude from God is greater is superior to all of that. That is the supreme triumph.

They the hypocrites swear by God that they said nothing of the defamation that has reached you as being from them; but they did indeed say the word of disbelief and did disbelieve after their submission to God they did indeed manifest disbelief after having manifested submission to God. And they purposed that which they never attained in the way of assassinating the Prophet on the night of al-‘Aqaba upon his return from Tabūk — there were about ten to twenty of them and ‘Ammār b. Yāsir struck the faces of their riding camels when they came against him and were thus repulsed; and they were only spiteful they detested that God and His Messenger should have enriched them of His bounty by way of spoils when they had been in dire need the meaning is that this was all that they attained from him which is nothing to be spiteful about. So if they repent of hypocrisy and believe in you it will be better for them; but if they turn away from belief God will chastise them with a painful chastisement in this world by having them killed and in the Hereafter in the Fire and they have none on earth as protector to guard them from Him or helper to defend them.

And some of them have made a covenant with God saying ‘If He gives us of His bounty we will give voluntary alms la-nassaddaqanna the original tā’ of natasaddaqanna has been assimilated with the sād and become of the righteous’ this was Tha‘laba b. Hātib who asked the Prophet s to supplicate on his behalf so that God would give him wealth of which he would give every needy person his due. He the Prophet thus supplicated for him and he became wealthy but stopped attending the Friday prayer and congregational prayers and refused to pay the alms-tax as God exalted be He says

Yet when He gave them of His bounty they became niggardly with it and turned away from obedience to God in aversion.

So He made the consequence in their case hypocrisy fixed in their hearts until the day they meet Him that is God on the Day of Resurrection because they failed God in what they promised Him and because of that concerning which they lied he Tha‘laba then brought the payment of his alms to the Prophet s who said to him ‘God has forbidden me to accept it from you’; so he Tha‘laba began to throw earth on his head in remorse. He then approached Abū Bakr with it who did not accept it. He then went to ‘Umar b. al-Khattāb who also did not accept it. He went to ‘Uthmān b. ‘Affān but he did not accept it; he died during the latter’s reign.

Did they the hypocrites not know that God knows their secret what they conceal within themselves and their confidential talks what they confide in each other and that God is the Knower of the hidden things? what is concealed from the eyes.

When the verse concerning ‘voluntary alms’ Q. 975 was revealed a man came and gave a large amount as voluntary alms so the hypocrites said ‘He is merely showing off!’ Another man then came and gave a moderate measure of food and so they said ‘God has no need of this man’s charity!’ The following was then revealed Those who alladhīna is the subject find fault with defame the believers who offer alms voluntarily performing supererogation and such as find nothing to offer but their endeavours nothing but what they are capable of and offer it; and deride them and the predicate of the mentioned subject is the following — God Himself derides them He has requited them for their derision and theirs will be a painful chastisement.

Ask forgiveness for them O Muhammad (s) or do not ask forgiveness for them this leaves the choice of asking forgiveness or refraining up to him; the Prophet s said ‘I have been given the choice and I made it’ meaning the choice to ask forgiveness as reported by al-Bukhārī. If you ask forgiveness for them seventy times God will not forgive them it is said that the ‘seventy’ is intended to express by hyperbole a great frequency of asking forgiveness. In the Sahīh of al-Bukhārī there is a hadīth which states ‘If I was sure that were I to ask more than seventy times God would forgive them I would have done so’. It is also said however that the very number seventy is actually meant on account of this other hadīth of his ‘I shall ask more than seventy times’ whereupon it was made clear to him the Prophet that the matter regarding forgiveness had been concluded by the verse Q. 636 Alike it will be regarding them whether you ask forgiveness for them or you do not ask forgiveness for them God will not forgive them; that is because they disbelieved in God and His Messenger; and God does not guide the wicked folk.