al-Nisāʾ 4:101-104

Wa idhā ḍarabtum fi'l-arḍi fa-laysa ʿalaykum junāḥun an taqṣurū mina'ṣ-ṣalāh … · Wa idhā kunta fīhim fa-aqamta lahumu'ṣ-ṣalāta fa'l-taqum ṭāʾifatun minhum maʿaka wa'l-yaʾkhudhū asliḥatahum … · Fa-idhā qaḍaytumu'ṣ-ṣalāta fa'dhkuru'llāha qiyāman wa quʿūdan wa ʿalā junūbikum … inna'ṣ-ṣalāta kānat ʿala'l-muʾminīna kitāban mawqūtā · Wa lā tahinū fi'btighāʾi'l-qawm, in takūnū taʾlamūna fa-innahum yaʾlamūna kamā taʾlamūn

"When you journey in the land there is no fault upon you in shortening the prayer… When you are among them and lead them in prayer, let one group of them stand with you and take up their weapons… When you have finished the prayer, remember God standing, sitting and lying on your sides… Prayer is an obligation upon the believers at appointed times. And do not grow weak in seeking out the enemy. If you are suffering, they are suffering as you suffer."

From these verses arose the discussions of classical jurisprudence on travel, the shortening of prayer and the forms of the prayer of fear. Those discussions are not entered into in this section and no legal ruling is issued. What is treated is the linguistic side of the verses.

The root و-ق-ت: the appointed time of a task. Waqt — a definite span of time; mawqūt — with its time appointed.

And the place where the expression stands must be recorded: in the very middle of a context of war.

I record this as my own reading, and its ground is the order of the verses: the hundred and second verse shows that the form of prayer can change; the hundred and third says that its time is not lifted. The block, that is, states two things at once: the form gives, the time stands.

The verse counts the remembrance to be made after prayer in three bodily postures: standing, sitting and lying on one's side.

And the root ق-و-م returns here once more. The root's occurrences in this sūra will be set out in a table in the concluding section.

The root ج-ن-ب also returns once more. The root occurs at the thirty-first verse as ijtanibū (keep away), at the thirty-sixth as al-junub and bi'l-janb (the neighbour and the companion), and here as junūbikum (your sides). The same root in three separate senses within the sūra. This is a countable fact.

This sentence in the hundred and fourth verse is one of the most striking places in the sūra and must be recorded separately.

The root ا-ل-م: to feel pain. Alam — pain.

And what the sentence does must be recorded: in the middle of a command to fight, it is said that the other side is suffering too.

The sentence could have been built like this, but it is not:

The verb is repeated three times: taʾlamūn, yaʾlamūn, taʾlamūn. And the third is set as a measure for the second: kamā taʾlamūn.

I record this as my own reading, and its ground is the repetition of the verb: the sentence makes the one addressed measure the other side's pain by his own. And what is given as the ground is not a piece of information but the addressee's own experience.

And the continuation of the sentence must be recorded: wa tarjūna mina'llāhi mā lā yarjūn — "and you hope from God what they do not hope." The verse, that is, sets the difference between the two sides not in the pain but in the hope.