يَٰٓأَيُّهَا ٱلنَّبِىُّ قُل لِّأَزْوَٰجِكَ وَبَنَاتِكَ وَنِسَآءِ ٱلْمُؤْمِنِينَ يُدْنِينَ عَلَيْهِنَّ مِن جَلَٰبِيبِهِنَّ ذَٰلِكَ أَدْنَىٰٓ أَن يُعْرَفْنَ فَلَا يُؤْذَيْنَ وَكَانَ ٱللَّهُ غَفُورًا رَّحِيمًا
Yā ayyuha'l-nabiyyu qul li-azwājika wa banātika wa nisāʾi'l-muʾminīna yudnīna ʿalayhinna min jalābībihinn, dhālika adnā an yuʿrafna fa-lā yuʾdhayn, wa kāna'llāhu ghafūran raḥīmā
"O Prophet! Say to your wives, your daughters and the believing women: let them draw their jilbābs over themselves. That is more likely that they be recognised and not injured. God is Forgiving, Merciful."
Per the method (Method), no legal ruling is issued on this verse. What will be done is this:
1. The lexical sense of the word and what the lexicographers give as its counterpart in that period will be conveyed. 2. The ground the verse itself gives will be brought forward. 3. It will be recorded that the rulings the schools have drawn from this verse differ, and the note "it is not binding" will be entered. 4. Current debates and politics will not be entered.
This widening must be recorded and was touched on at the thirty-third verse: when the sūra wishes to generalise a ruling it does so explicitly.
In the twenty-eighth verse the address was azwājika alone; in verses thirty to thirty-four it was yā nisāʾa'l-nabiyy. In the fifty-ninth a third circle is added.
And this root occurs in the sūra for the third time: adnā (51), adnā (in the second half of 59), and here yudnīna. The word dunyā is also from the same root (28).
And the root occurs twice within the verse: yudnīna (the verb) and adnā (the elative). Two words from the same root, one carrying the command and the other the ground.
The sense of the verb: to bring near, to let fall, to draw down a thing towards oneself or towards a place. The verse describes how the garment is to be used as a movement.
Singular جِلْبَاب. Root: ج-ل-ب. And the primary sense of the root is to bring a thing from one place to another, to draw it along: jalaba — he brought, he conveyed. Jalb — drawing, bringing.
What the lexicographers give as the word's counterpart in that period is this, and it carries no full certainty:
| The descriptions found in the sources | What it says |
|---|---|
| A wide covering that covers from head to foot | An outer garment taken over the body |
| A garment larger than a head-covering and smaller than a ridāʾ | A size between two garments |
| The outer covering a woman puts on over her dress | Taken over the indoor garment |
The lexicographers do not agree on the word's exact counterpart. The common point that can be recorded is this: a jilbāb is not an inner garment but a covering taken over when going out.
And the particle min must be dwelt on: min jalābībihinn — "of their jilbābs". Whether this min is partitive or explicative (indicating the class) has been debated in classical exegesis.
| Reading | What it says |
|---|---|
| Partitive | "Let them draw a part of their jilbābs over themselves" — a portion of the covering |
| Explicative | "Let them draw something of the jilbāb kind over themselves" |
I do not impose a preference. The same discussion was recorded for the particle minhum at al-Fatḥ 48/29.
And I record this in addition: the verse does not give how the covering is to be drawn, what area it is to cover, its measure or its form. The only thing it gives is a verb: yudnīna ʿalayhinna.
عَرَفَ — root ع-ر-ف. To know, to recognise. And this root for the third time in the sūra (in 6 and 32 as maʿrūf, here as yuʿrafna).
That is, the sūra's axis of injury is tied here to a precaution, and the close comes with a precaution.
One. The ground is tied not to a fault in the woman but to a threat outside. The verse does not say "this is more decorous" or "this is more fitting". It states a consequence: they will not be injured.
Two. The ground is in the passive: yuʿrafna (they are recognised), yuʾdhayna (they are injured). The agent of neither verb is named. That is, the verse does not name the party that recognises or the party that injures; it states only the outcome.
Three. And the same pattern as in the fifty-first verse: dhālika adnā. Both verses bring a regulation and give its ground with this pattern, and both grounds look to people's inward condition and to what they are exposed to.
In the classical exegetical sources it is transmitted that at that time some women in the city were harassed outside, and that this regulation aimed to prevent the harassment by making them recognisable. In the sixtieth verse "those who spread baseless news in the city" will be named in the same context.
I give this account with the note "it is transmitted", do not enter into its detail, and do not make it a condition of the verse's meaning.
What emerges from the text itself runs in the same direction anyway: the verse's clause of ground speaks of a possibility of being injured. That is, even with no information brought in from outside, the text points to an atmosphere of threat.
There are differences among the schools and the exegetes on the rulings drawn from this verse and from al-Nūr 24/31. The difference gathers at these points:
| The point at issue | The situation |
|---|---|
| The extent of the covering | There are differing views on which areas are to be covered |
| The function of the particle min | Partitive or explicative — recorded above |
| Whether the ruling depends on the ground | It has been debated what the ruling would be if the ground (being recognised) were removed |
| Its relation to al-Nūr 24/31 | How the two verses complete one another |
And I enter the note of Method explicitly: what is given here is a conveying of information, and it is not binding. A ruling about anyone's practice is not the subject of this text.
Current debates and politics are not entered. This verse has been the material of a great many political disputes over the last two centuries; this commentary is not, and cannot be, a party to any of them.
| Verse | The regulation | The verse-ending |
|---|---|---|
| 5 | The ascription of lineage | ghafūran raḥīmā |
| 24 | The close of the siege section | ghafūran raḥīmā |
| 50 | A ruling particular to the Prophet | ghafūran raḥīmā |
| 59 | The jilbāb | ghafūran raḥīmā |
Wherever it lays down a ruling the sūra enters a note of forgiveness. I record this as my own reading; its ground is the position of the four verse-endings.
And this has a function: a statement of forgiveness coming after a regulation means that it is reckoned with from the outset that the regulation cannot be carried out flawlessly.
In speaking about what this verse says to the present it is necessary to keep to the verse's own ground.
This ground puts a fact on record: in a society people may be under the risk of being injured outside. And the verse accepts this as a datum and proposes a precaution.
But there is something the verse does not say, and it must be recorded: the verse does not legitimise injury. On the contrary, the preceding verse (58) had named injury explicitly as buhtān and ithm.
That the two verses come one after the other is important for this reason, and I record it as my own reading:
| Verse | To whom | What it says |
|---|---|---|
| 58 | To the one who injures | buhtānan wa ithman mubīnā — this is what you have taken on |
| 59 | To the one injured | A precaution |
That is, the sūra does not resolve the matter one-sidedly. The ruling about the one who injures was given in the preceding verse; the precaution is proposed in the following one.
And this order must be recorded: the ruling comes first, the precaution after. The sūra first names the act, then states the precaution.