لِلَّذِينَ لَا يُؤْمِنُونَ بِٱلْـَٔاخِرَةِ مَثَلُ ٱلسَّوْءِ وَلِلَّهِ ٱلْمَثَلُ ٱلْأَعْلَىٰ وَهُوَ ٱلْعَزِيزُ ٱلْحَكِيمُ · وَلَوْ يُؤَاخِذُ ٱللَّهُ ٱلنَّاسَ بِظُلْمِهِم مَّا تَرَكَ عَلَيْهَا مِن دَآبَّةٍ وَلَٰكِن يُؤَخِّرُهُمْ إِلَىٰٓ أَجَلٍ مُّسَمًّى · وَيَجْعَلُونَ لِلَّهِ مَا يَكْرَهُونَ وَتَصِفُ أَلْسِنَتُهُمُ ٱلْكَذِبَ أَنَّ لَهُمُ ٱلْحُسْنَىٰ لَا جَرَمَ أَنَّ لَهُمُ ٱلنَّارَ وَأَنَّهُم مُّفْرَطُونَ
Lilladhīna lā yuʾminūna bi'l-ākhirati mathalu'l-sawʾ, wa li'llāhi'l-mathalu'l-aʿlā, wa huwa'l-ʿazīzu'l-ḥakīm · Wa law yuʾākhidhu'llāhu'l-nāsa bi-ẓulmihim mā taraka ʿalayhā min dābbatin wa lākin yuʾakhkhiruhum ilā ajalin musammā · Wa yajʿalūna li'llāhi mā yakrahūna wa taṣifu alsinatuhumu'l-kadhiba anna lahumu'l-ḥusnā, lā jarama anna lahumu'l-nāra wa annahum mufraṭūn
"To those who do not believe in the hereafter belongs the likeness of evil; and to God belongs the highest likeness. He is the Mighty, the Wise. · Were God to take people to task for their wrongdoing He would not leave a single creature upon the earth; but He defers them to an appointed term. · They assign to God what they themselves dislike, and their tongues frame the lie that the best is theirs. Beyond doubt the Fire is theirs, and they are sent on ahead."
This verse occurs at Fāṭir, 35/45, in almost the same words, and was treated there in detail as the closing verse of that sūra. I rely on that treatment. What was recorded there:
"عَلَىٰ ظَهْرِهَا — 'upon its back'. The verse does not say what the pronoun refers to; the lexicographers record that it is the earth." "In telling of the deferral of the punishment the scope is not kept to man — min dābba, every living thing upon the earth." "إِلَىٰٓ أَجَلٍ مُّسَمًّى — to a term that has been named. The same construction was treated at al-Aḥqāf, 46/3, and at al-Zumar, 39/42."
| Fāṭir 35/45 | al-Naḥl 16/61 | |
|---|---|---|
| The cause | Bimā kasabū — for what they have earned | Bi-ẓulmihim — for their wrongdoing |
| The pronoun | ʿAlā ẓahrihā — "upon its back" | ʿAlayhā — "upon it" |
| Its place in the sūra | The last verse — a closing | In the middle — inside a block |
I record this as an observation: Fāṭir uses a general word for what is earned; al-Naḥl, in the middle of a sūra and directly after the scene of the infant daughter, narrows the word and says wrongdoing. The context explains the choice of word.
The lexicographers give the concrete sense of the root thus: to go ahead, to go in front; and to neglect a thing and leave it behind. Faraṭ — the scout who goes ahead of the caravan to find water.
There is disagreement over the reading and the sense of the word here, and it must be set out in a table:
| Reading | Word | Sense |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Mufraṭūn (with fatḥa on the rāʾ) | Sent on ahead, dispatched first to the Fire — from the picture of the faraṭ |
| 2 | Mufriṭūn (with kasra on the rāʾ) | Those who overstep — from the root ifrāṭ |
| 3 | Mufarriṭūn | Those who neglect, who leave things behind — from the root tafrīṭ |
All three readings are transmitted in the sources on the variant readings, and the sense changes accordingly. I do not impose a preference.
And the first reading has a certain internal appeal, which I record as an observation: an irony is set up between the concrete picture in the root (the scout of the caravan) and the subject of the sentence (the going to the Fire) — to be in front is not, this time, a distinction.