جَزَآءًۢ بِمَا كَانُوا۟ يَعْمَلُونَ
Everything set out from the twelfth verse to here — the gardens, the couches, the vessels, the fruit, the flesh of birds, the wide-eyed ḥūr — is bound by a single word: jazāʾan.
Word order: jazāʾan is in the accusative, and the grammarians generally count it either a causal complement (mafʿūl lahu) or the absolute object of an omitted verb. Both parsings give the same result: it states why what has been enumerated is given.
And its place is meaningful: at the end of the table. First the scene is built, then its ground is stated. The reverse order was possible; the text chose this one.
Root: ج-ز-ي. The description the lexicographers give: a return that is the equal of a thing. In the root there is an idea of sufficiency: jazāʾ is what closes a debt, what makes it equal. From the same root ajzaʾa (to suffice for something) and jizya.
The narrowing in the usual English rendering must be noticed: "punishment" conveys only the negative return. In Arabic the word is neutral — the return for good is jazāʾ and so is the return for evil. And indeed in this verse it is used of the Garden.
The root will not occur a second time in the sūra; but the same idea will return at 56/93 with another word: fa-nuzulun min ḥamīm — there too what has been enumerated will be sealed with a word of "hospitality", but its content will have been turned over.
كَانَ + an imperfect verb. In Arabic this combination conveys an act that was repeated in the past and became habitual. Not "what they did" but "what they used to do".
The verse is not speaking of a single deed. It speaks of a working that ran through a lifetime. And this is meaningful when one looks at the table: the things enumerated are lasting (mukhalladūn, maknūn), and the act that answers to them is continuous.
| View | The kind of bāʾ | The sense that arises |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Bāʾ al-sababiyya (cause) | The deed is the cause of the giving; but it is not its price |
| 2 | Bāʾ al-ʿiwaḍ (exchange) | The deed is the price of what is given |
This distinction directly affects the outcome. On the first reading a deed opens a door; on the second it pays a price.
It is widely transmitted that the classical theological literature prefers the first reading, the ground given being that a limited deed cannot be the price of an unlimited return. Moreover, in the sound hadith collections there is a report stating that no one enters the Garden by his deed; in that report God's mercy is put in the place of the deed.
And this tension must be allowed to stand plainly: the verse says jazāʾan bimā kānū yaʿmalūn — it establishes a link, that is, between deed and return. The report says that the deed alone does not suffice. The two do not cancel one another; the two answer two separate questions — the one the question "on what does the return depend?", the other the question "by what is the return measured?"