Az-Zumar (The Groups)

Verse 56

Table of Contents

    56. Lest a person should say “Alas, my grief that I was undutiful to Allah and I was indeed among those who mocked [His Verses].”

    The Day of Resurrection is the Day of Regret. Underrating Divine Injunctions, and worse than that, mocking them all spring from neglect.

    Following the emphatic injunction as to repentance and compensation for the past wrong deeds, the blessed Verse in question is saying that these injunctions have been sent down lest on the Day of Resurrection one may say:

    “Woe to me that I failed to act upon Divine Command and I mocked His Verses and Messengers.”

    The word hasra is employed in the sense of sorrow and grief caused by past regrettable acts. In his Mufradat, Raghib says that the word derives from hasr indicating pull way or remove garment but it figuratively connotes regret about and grieve for the past acts as if the veils of ignorance have been removed.

    When man is raised on the Day of Resurrection and perceives the consequences of his transgressions of bounds, neglects, sins, underrating serious affairs, will cry out “Woe to me!” A dire sense of grief and regret wraps up his heart and expresses himself with such interjections.

    Exegets differ as to the meaning of

    janb Allah (“beside Allah”)

    and present many a suggestion.

    The word is literally employed in the sense of side and it applies to anything located at the side of something else, in the same manner that yamin and yasar signify right and left sides of the body respectively, but owing to generalization, they imply anything located at the left and right sides.

    The phrase:

    “beside Allah”

    also ad hoc designate all the affairs beside Him, e.g. His Command, Obedience to Him, Closeness to Him, The Divine Books sent down by Him.

    Thus, the sinful regret about and grieve for their undutifulness against Allah and particularly lay emphasis on mocking Qur’anic Verses and Divinely appointed Messengers, since their wrong acts mainly stem from their neglect and derision which in turn spring from ignorance, vanity, and bias.1

    Footnotes

    1. As per many a tradition narrated from Shi’i Imams (as), “beside Allah” is interpreted as “Shi’i Imams,” for instance a tradition narrated from Imam Musa ibn Ja’far (as) mentioned in Usul Kafi interprets “Alas, my grief that I was undutiful to Allah” as: “‘Beside Allah’ indicates the Commander of the Faithful, Ali (as) and also his eminent successors to the last of them [i.e., Imam Mahdi (as)].” It is also reported from Imam Sadiq (as) in ‘Ali ibn Ibrahim’s exegetic work that “We are ‘beside Allah.’” See Tafsir Nur al-Thiqalayn, vol. 4, p. 495. ↩