وَلَقَدْ ضَرَبْنَا لِلنَّاسِ فِى هَٰذَا ٱلْقُرْءَانِ مِن كُلِّ مَثَلٍ وَلَئِن جِئْتَهُم بِـَٔايَةٍ لَّيَقُولَنَّ ٱلَّذِينَ كَفَرُوٓا۟ إِنْ أَنتُمْ إِلَّا مُبْطِلُونَ · كَذَٰلِكَ يَطْبَعُ ٱللَّهُ عَلَىٰ قُلُوبِ ٱلَّذِينَ لَا يَعْلَمُونَ
Wa laqad ḍarabnā li'n-nāsi fī hādha'l-Qurʾāni min kulli mathal, wa la-in jiʾtahum bi-āyatin la-yaqūlanna'lladhīna kafarū in antum illā mubṭilūn · Kadhālika yaṭbaʿu'llāhu ʿalā qulūbi'lladhīna lā yaʿlamūn
"We have surely struck for people in this Qurʾān every kind of parable. But were you to bring them a sign, those who deny would certainly say: 'You are nothing but purveyors of falsehood'. Thus does God set a seal upon the hearts of those who do not know."
مُبْطِل — root ب-ط-ل: to be empty, groundless, void. Bāṭil — the opposite of the true; the lexicographers record the core of the root as "to come to nothing, to be left void". The active participle of Form IV: "one who puts forward what has no ground".
The form of the objection is worth recording, and I give this as my own reading: the other side does not discuss the āya that is brought — it characterises those who bring it. In antum illā mubṭilūn — the subject of the sentence is not the evidence but the ones addressed.
The same mechanism had been treated at Fuṣṣilat 41/44: there a counterfactual situation was set up, and it was shown that whichever option obtained, an objection fitted to it would be found. I rely on that treatment.
| Place | How it is shown |
|---|---|
| Fuṣṣilat 41/44 | By setting up a hypothesis — "what would they have said had it been otherwise?" |
| al-Rūm 30/58 | By setting up a condition — wa la-in jiʾtahum bi-āyatin la-yaqūlanna |
Both show that the objection arises not from the content but from the attitude. And al-Rūm's sentence gives this with the emphasis of la-yaqūlanna (they will certainly say): the outcome is known in advance.
مِن كُلِّ مَثَلٍ — "every kind of parable". And this forms a ring with the twenty-eighth verse of the sūra: there it was said ḍaraba lakum mathalan min anfusikum — a single parable. Here the whole body of the parables is mentioned.
The root ط-ب-ع was treated in Muḥammad and in al-Munāfiqūn. I do not repeat it here. The core: to set a seal, to stamp; and to give a thing a lasting form. Ṭabʿ — both a seal and a nature or character.
And the joining of the sentence must be recorded: kadhālika — "thus". That is, the seal is mentioned after the attitude described in the preceding verse.
I record this as an observation about the word order, and per the method (Method) I write the boundary as well: the verse's sequence gives the attitude first and the seal after. From this I do not enter into the debate on destiny or on "whose responsibility the failure to believe is"; I confine myself to recording the literal order of the sentence.
And the name of those who are sealed must be recorded: alladhīna lā yaʿlamūn — those who do not know. The expression that occurred in the sixth and thirtieth verses of the sūra here names the subject of the seal. That is, the sentence repeated throughout the sūra is tied at the end to a verdict.