Saba (Sheba)

38. “And those who strive against Our signs to void them, they shall be arraigned into the chastisement.”

39. “Say: ‘Verily my Lord amplifies the sustenance for whom He pleases of His servants and straitens (it) for him and whatever thing you spend He replaces it; and He is the Best Sustainers’.”

In order to wipe out the Truth, enemy always uses his best effort. So, in this verse, the Qur’an implies that those who try to nullify Allah’s signs not only they themselves do not have Faith, but also do not let others pave the path of Truth, while they imagine that they can escape from the grips of the Power of Allah, while they will be brought into the painful chastisement on the Hereafter Day.

Since there is no word about future in the sentence:

“They shall be arraigned into the chastisement”,

it may point to this sense that in this world they are also involved in chastisement just now. What chastisement is worse than this prison which he has built for him by his wealth and children?

The verse says:

“And those who strive against Our signs to void them, they shall be arraigned into the chastisement.”

There is also this probability that the above meaning is for the sake that this Divine promise is so certain that as if they are in it just now in the same way that it has been mentioned in the previous holy verse:

“…and they in the exalted places shall be secure.”

As some philologists have said, the application of the Qur’anic term /mu‘ajizin/ means that they imagine that they can flee from the realm of Allah’s Power and His punishment, while this is a mere baseless delusion.

Through the next verse, Qur’an says:

“Say: ‘Verily my Lord amplifies the sustenance for whom He pleases of His servants and straitens (it) for him…”

Then it continues saying:

“…and whatever thing you spend He replaces it; and He is the Best Sustainers’.”

The content of the verse is an emphasis on the previous matter, but from two points of view it is new.

The first is that the previous verse the concept of which was the same as this one was mostly about wealth, children, and disbelievers, while the application of the Arabic word /‘ibad/ (servants) in the verse under discussion shows that it refers to the believers.

That is, concerning the believers, He sometimes amplifies the sustenance - where it is good for the believer - and He sometimes straitens and limits the sustenance in the place where it requires. However, the vastness and narrowness of sustenance can cot be the evidence for anything.

The second matter is that the previous holy verse said about the vastness and narrowness of sustenance and living concerning two different groups of men, while the verse under discussion may be a hint to two different states of one person whose sustenance is vast and sometimes is straitened and limited.

Moreover, what is mentioned at the beginning of this verse is, in fact, a preliminary for that which is at the end of the verse, i.e. encouraging to spending in the cause of Allah.

The Qur’anic sentence /fahuwa yuxlifuhu/ (He replaces it) is an interesting meaning which shows that whatever is spent in the cause of Allah is, in fact, a rich profitable bargain, because Allah undertakes its recompense; and we know that when a gracious one undertakes the recompense of something he does not observe equality, but he pays it back several folds, and sometimes hundred folds.

The promise of Allah, of course, is not limited to Hereafter and next life, which is certain in its turn, but in this world, too, He gives kinds of favours abundantly instead of those godly payments.

The Qur’anic sentence

“…and He is the Best sustainers”

has a vast meaning which can be considered from different dimensions.

He is the Best of all sustainers because He knows what to bestow and how much of provision He may endow that it would not be the cause of mischief and corruption, and He knows everything.

Whatever He wills He can grant to whomever He wishes, because He is powerful to do everything.

Allah does not demand any recompense for what He bestows, because He is self-sufficient in Essence.

Allah grants the things even without asking them from Him, because He is aware of all things, and He is Wise.

And none, but He, is the giver of sustenance, since whatever a person has is from Him, and whatever a person gives to another one the person is the means of transferring the sustenance, not the giver of sustenance.

This point is also noteworthy that for fleeting properties He gives some lasting bounties, and He gives ‘abundant’ recompense for a ‘scanty’ deed.