وَٱلَّذِى قَالَ لِوَٰلِدَيْهِ أُفٍّ لَّكُمَآ
"And the one who says to his parents, 'ugh to you both! Do you threaten me that I shall be brought out of the earth, when so many generations have passed away before me?'…"
This verse carries the same structure as the portrait in the fifteenth verse, and the two can be compared item by item:
| 46/15 | 46/17 | |
|---|---|---|
| Relationship | Parents | Parents |
| The words | Rabbi awziʿnī an ashkura | Uffin lakumā |
| Direction | A prayer for thanks and for his offspring | Objection and refusal |
| Evidence | His own birth | Qad khalati'l-qurūnu min qablī — the generations past |
The evidence the second portrait puts forward is striking: "many generations passed before me" — that is, none came back. This is the demand for evidence in the first block (46/4) built the other way round: there evidence was being asked for; here absence is offered as evidence.
The word is a noun standing for a verb (ism al-fiʿl): a sound conveying weariness, disgust and constriction. The lexicographers give differing explanations of its origin; the point they share is that the word carries not a meaning but a state.
The same word is forbidden towards parents at al-Isrāʾ 17/23 (fa-lā taqul lahumā uff). What is seen when the two verses are read together is this: the smallest utterance forbidden there comes here as the first sentence of the portrait.
وَهُمَا يَسْتَغِيثَانِ ٱللَّهَ وَيْلَكَ ءَامِنْ — "and the two of them, calling on God for help, say 'woe to you, believe!'"
Istighātha — root غ-و-ث: the cry for rescue of one who is drowning or in straits. The choice of the word shows the position of the parents: like someone trying not to persuade but to save.
فَيَقُولُ مَا هَٰذَآ إِلَّآ أَسَٰطِيرُ ٱلْأَوَّلِينَ — the answer comes out at the same door as ifkun qadīm (an old fabrication) in the eleventh verse: to invalidate a thing by counting it as belonging to the past.