Al-Fath (The Victory)

12. “Nay, but [your disobedience and flight was because] you thought that the Messenger and the believers would never return [safe and sound] to their families and that was made fair-seeming in your hearts and you did entertain an evil thought and you became a vain people going for perdition.”

13. And whosoever does not believe in Allah and His Messenger, then truly, We have prepared for disbelievers a blazing Fire.

The Arabic word bur designates bankruptcy, disgrace, and perdition. Some deeds are evil by human natural disposition, but Satan and Concupiscence make them seem fair to man so that he may commit them. Those Arabs who had turned away from jihad thought that Muslims would all be defeated and killed; consequently, fear, meanness, deprivation, and disgrace fell into their share.

The blessed Verses in question address those Arabs saying unto them that they entertained suspicion and doubt imagining that the Messenger of Allah (S) and believers who accompanied him at Hudaybiyya would never return to Medina as they would be destroyed by the Quraysh. Satan made such evil thought seem fair to them.

“They entertained an evil thought and became a vain people going for perdition.”

Consequently, they were deprived of embarking upon that historic journey, the pledge of the tree, and other honors. It entailed such disgrace, perdition, and excruciating torment in the Hereafter.

Their hearts were dead as a consequence of which such dire fate was in store for them. Since such wrong acts sprang at times from faithlessness, Verse 13 is saying that:

“Whosoever does not believe in Allah and His Messenger (S), then truly, We have prepared for disbelievers a blazing Fire.”