قُلْ أَرَءَيْتُم مَّآ أَنزَلَ ٱللَّهُ لَكُم مِّن رِّزْقٍ فَجَعَلْتُم مِّنْهُ حَرَامًا وَحَلَٰلًا قُلْ ءَآللَّهُ أَذِنَ لَكُمْ أَمْ عَلَى ٱللَّهِ تَفْتَرُونَ
"Say: 'Tell me: of what God has sent down to you as provision, you have made some forbidden and some lawful. Did God give you leave, or are you inventing against God?' · And what will those who invent lies against God think about the day of resurrection?"
The verse is a question about authority, and the form of the question must be recorded: āllāhu adhina lakum — "did God give you leave?"
And the word leave comes from the third verse of the sūra: illā min baʿdi idhnih. The same word, once for intercession and once for a ruling. I record this as an observation about the wording.
A note per the method (Method): no legal ruling is issued in this commentary. What the verse says in its own words is where the authority to declare things lawful and forbidden is taken from — I issue no ruling about any particular list of foods.
And the historical background of the verse is transmitted in the classical sources: the Arabs' counting certain animals forbidden by rules of their own making. The Qurʾān names this practice elsewhere (al-Anʿām 6/136-140, al-Māʾida 5/103). I give this connection at the level of the verse; I do not go into detail.
وَمَا ظَنُّ ٱلَّذِينَ يَفْتَرُونَ عَلَى ٱللَّهِ ٱلْكَذِبَ يَوْمَ ٱلْقِيَٰمَةِ (60) — and the word ẓann comes once more, this time as a question.
I record this as an observation about the word order: in the thirty-sixth verse ẓann was what is followed; here it is asked about as an expectation concerning the reckoning. The same word in two distinct offices: in the one it is put in the place of a proof, in the other it guesses at an outcome.