إِلَّا مَن تَوَلَّىٰ وَكَفَرَ فَيُعَذِّبُهُ ٱللَّهُ ٱلْعَذَابَ ٱلْأَكْبَرَ
Illā man tawallā wa kafar — fa-yuʿadhdhibuhu'llāhu'l-ʿadhāba'l-akbar "But whoever turns away and covers over, God will punish him with the greatest punishment."
Where these two verses attach grammatically is one of the old debates of exegesis. Because illā is a particle of exception, and an exception requires a "whole" before it. But what is the whole?
| View | How it is read | Its ground | Objection |
|---|---|---|---|
| Disjoined exception | Illā here has the sense of "but, save that". Not a real exception but a transition: "But whoever turns away and covers over, God will punish him." | This use of illā is settled in Arabic. And the sense comes out without a snag: you are not one who compels — but the one who turns away will not go unpunished | It moves away from the particle's original function |
| It attaches to verse 21 | An exception from the command fa-dhakkir (remind): "remind — but not those who turn away" | The place the command is nearest to | Contrary to the Qurʾān's general attitude: a command not to remind the one who turns away is not given anywhere else; on the contrary, insistence is enjoined |
| It attaches to verse 22 | An exception from the state of not being a muṣayṭir: "you are not one who rules over them, except against the one who turns away…" | The immediately preceding sentence | It can be read as giving the Prophet an authority of compulsion against the one who turns away; this conflicts with the Qurʾān's other verses, and the rest of the verse does not permit it — the one who punishes is God, not the messenger |
The first view is the widespread one and is my preference. My ground is this: the subject of verse 24 is plainly God (fa-yuʿadhdhibuhu'llāh). That is, the sentence does not give the Prophet an authority; it gives a piece of news. This makes the second and third readings difficult; the first reading works directly.
This preference is not binding. All three views are found in the classical sources and are possible grammatically.
And this must be added: whichever reading is taken, the function of the two verses is the same. The sūra, having said "you are not one who compels", does not leave a gap. The absence of compulsion does not mean the absence of a consequence. The messenger has no sanction in his hand; but it is not that there is no sanction.
Root: و-ل-ي. And the root's original sense is nearness: to be adjacent to a thing, to come after it, to be in its vicinity.
- وَلِيّ (walī) — near one, friend, protector. One of the names of God.
- مَوْلَى (mawlā) — master, friend, near one.
- وِلَايَة (walāya) — nearness, friendship; and governance.
- تَالِي / يَلِي — that which comes after.
Now let us look at the state of the word in the verse. Tawallā is in Form V, and in this form the root turns in the opposite direction: to come out of nearness, to turn one's back and go off.
That the same root should carry both "to be a friend" and "to turn one's back" gives the picture of the word: both are a matter of direction. The near one has turned his face; the one going off has turned his back.
The Qurʾān uses this verb often: "He turned away and grew proud" (al-Muddaththir 74/23); "Then he turned his back" (al-Najm 53/33).
The verb has one further nicety: tawallā conveys a physical movement — to turn one's back and go. That is, rejection is described here not as a debate but as a withdrawal. The person is not opposing; he is leaving.
Root: ك-ف-ر. This root was treated in detail in the discussion of al-Baqara 2/6; I do not repeat the analysis there, I recall its conclusion:
The sense of the root is to cover, to close over. The farmer is called kāfir in Arabic because he covers the seed with soil (al-Ḥadīd 57/20); the night is called kāfir because it covers everything; kaffāra is the amends that covers over an offence.
And the critical conclusion there: unbelief is not a failure to know; it is the covering over of what one knows. Moreover, in the Qurʾān what is most often set against kufr is not īmān but thankfulness (shukr) — that is, unbelief is basically a notion of ingratitude.
This definition is particularly at work in al-Ghāshiya. Because two verses earlier four things were asked to be looked at: the camel, the sky, the mountain, the earth. Kafara is to cover those four over — not to look, or to look and disregard.
The order of the two verbs is meaningful too: first tawallā (he turned his back), then kafara (he covered over). One who turns his back has already come to a state of not seeing; the covering comes after it. I record this as an observation.
In Arabic, when the elative comes definite it requires a comparison. The question is: greater than what?
| In relation to what | Explanation |
|---|---|
| The punishment of this world | The destruction, hunger, war and loss that came upon the peoples |
| The punishment of the grave | Between death and the resurrection |
| The other kinds of punishment | The different degrees of hell |
"Truly, before the greatest punishment We shall make them taste of the nearer punishment; perhaps they will return" (al-Sajda 32/21).
- العذاب الأدنى (al-ʿadhābu'l-adnā) — "the nearest / the lowest punishment". Adnā means both "near" and "low".
- العذاب الأكبر (al-ʿadhābu'l-akbar) — "the greatest punishment".
The contrast is set up on two axes at once: near/great and low/great. That is, the hardships of this world are both nearer and smaller.
And the verse of al-Sajda has one further note that must not be passed over: "perhaps they will return" — laʿallahum yarjiʿūn. That is, the function of the smaller punishment is not to penalise but to turn them back. This will connect with the last two verses of al-Ghāshiya: there too a return (iyāb) will be mentioned.
Note the form of the verb: fa-yuʿadhdhibuhu — imperfect (present/future) and in Form II (ʿadhdhaba). Form II here conveys intensity. In the discussion of al-Humaza the takthīr function of this form was treated; the same rule holds here.