وَٱلَّذِينَ ٱهْتَدَوْا۟ زَادَهُمْ هُدًى وَءَاتَىٰهُمْ تَقْوَىٰهُمْ
"And as for those who have found the way, [God] has increased them in guidance and has given them their guarding of themselves."
| 47/16 | 47/17 | |
|---|---|---|
| Who | minhum man yastamiʿu | alladhīna'htadaw |
| Form of the verb | ٱسْتَمَعَ — Form X | ٱهْتَدَىٰ — Form VIII |
| Outcome | mādhā qāla ānifā — nothing | زَادَهُمْ هُدًى — increase |
| Diagnosis | ṭabaʿa'llāhu ʿalā qulūbihim | wa ātāhum taqwāhum |
- ٱسْتَمَعَ (Form X) — to lend one's ear; a deliberate act.
- ٱهْتَدَىٰ (Form VIII) — to seek guidance, to try to find the way; deliberate again.
That is, the place where the two groups part is not "one made an effort and the other did not". Both of them did something.
The distinction enters an area connected with the analysis of ز-ي-غ recorded at 61/5 in the section al-Ṣaff — what was recorded there about how an inclination becomes fixed works here too. It may be consulted; I do not repeat it here.
Root: ه-د-ي. This root was treated in detail in the section al-Fātiḥa (ihdina'ṣ-ṣirāṭa'l-mustaqīm) and taken up again in al-Balad, al-Ḍuḥā, al-Aʿlā, al-Mulk and al-Nāziʿāt. I do not repeat it here. In summary: the concrete sense of the root is to show the way, to go in front; and hadiyya (a gift) is from the same root — something directed towards someone.
ٱهْتَدَىٰ — "he found guidance, he entered the right way". This form here announces acceptance of the result of an act (muṭāwaʿa).
That is: hadāhu fa'htadā — "He guided him, and he took the way". The verb is the meeting of a guidance that comes from outside.
This explains the structure of the verse: ihtidāʾ is already an act of receiving. And more is given to the one who receives.
| View | Agent | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | God | "God increased their guidance" |
| 2 | The words they heard / the sūra sent down | "Those words increased their guidance" |
| 3 | Guidance itself | "Guidance increased them" |
In the classical commentaries the first and second views are widely transmitted. The ground of the second is the context: in the preceding verse a word was being listened to.
I make no preference. But I record this: if the second view is accepted, the opposition between the two verses is complete — the same words leave no trace at all in one and produce increase in the other.
The Qurʾān sets this idea up explicitly in several places, and in all of them it uses the same verb (ز-ي-د):
"When a sūra is sent down, some of them say: 'Which of you has this increased in faith?' As for those who believe, it has increased them in faith and they rejoice. As for those in whose hearts is a disease, it has added defilement to their defilement." (al-Tawba 9/124-125)
These two verses are almost an exact counterpart of our verses 16-17 — and there too the matter is the sending down of a sūra. Indeed verse 20 of this sūra will take up exactly this: "When a sūra is sent down it is said…"
"And We send down of the Qurʾān that which is a healing and a mercy for the believers; and it increases the wrongdoers in nothing but loss." (al-Isrāʾ 17/82)
And this is the most remarkable feature of the verse — I record it as my own reading: the text describes itself as a separator. The work of the word is not only to give information; it is to divide those addressed. The same words, spoken to two people, move the two apart from one another.
These two together look strange: is taqwā not a state a person earns for himself? If it is something given, why is it called "theirs"?
| View | Explanation |
|---|---|
| 1 | Taqwāhum = "the taqwā that befits them, that belongs to them" — to each according to his own rank. |
| 2 | Taqwāhum = "the reward of their taqwā" — the governed term elided (thawāba taqwāhum). |
| 3 | Taqwā itself has been given; the power to accomplish is a gift. |
But I record an observation — it is my own reading: the double structure of the expression (its being both given and belonging to them) may be not a tension but a description. What is most a person's own may at the same time have been given to him. The wording holds both directions at once: ātāhum (given) and taqwāhum (theirs).
And the word taqwā: the root is و-ق-ي — to guard, to guard oneself. The word has been treated in many places in this commentary (al-Baqara, al-Ḥujurāt and others) and I do not repeat it here. In summary: taqwā is, before fear, guarding; it is putting a shield between oneself and something.
Verses sixteen and seventeen together say something about knowledge, and what they say looks to the present without any need to force it.
Two people who listen to the same lesson do not take away the same thing. This is a fact everyone knows, and it is generally explained by "attention", "intelligence" or "prior knowledge".
The distinction the verse sets is none of these. In both verses there is an act of listening, and in both there is intent. The distinction shows itself in what the listener means to do: in one, a question is asked on the way out; in the other, there is increase.
And the scene of the sixteenth verse is more than familiar today: a talk is listened to, one sits through it from beginning to end, one even takes notes; and when it is over not a single sentence remains. The act has been performed in full; the result has not formed.
The verse does not explain the cause of this as "inattention". The diagnosis it gives is far heavier and has two parts: the heart's having been sealed, and desire's being followed. Whether the second is the cause or the consequence of the first — the verse does not say, and neither do I.