Surah An-Nisa 4:116-126 - Quran Translation Commentary

116. Verily, Allah pardons not, that partners should be ascribed to Him (shirk)¹⁹⁶; but He pardons other sins than this, whom He pleases¹⁹⁷. And he who joins other gods with Allah has strayed far, far away.

117. They invoke in His stead the female gods¹⁹⁸; and (really) they invoke none else but Satan, a rebel¹⁹⁹.

118. Allah has cursed him²⁰⁰. And he had said to Allah: “I will take of your slaves an appointed portion²⁰¹.

119. “And surely I will lead them astray, and surely I will arouse hopes in them²⁰², and surely I will command them and they will cut the cattle’s ears²⁰³, and surely I will command them and they will change the form of Allah’s creation²⁰⁴.” And whoever, forsaking Allah, took Satan for a friend, has verily suffered an obvious loss.

120. He promises them and stirs up hopes in them, and Satan’s promises are nothing but deception.

121. The abode of such persons will be Hell, and from it they will find no way of escape.

122. And those who believe and perform righteous acts,–We shall soon admit them to gardens, with rivers flowing beneath,–to dwell there in forever. Allah’s promise is the truth, and who is truer in his word than Allah !

123. (Salvation) is not dependent on your desires, nor on those of the people of the Book. Whoever performs evil deeds, will be requited accordingly²⁰⁵, nor will he find besides Allah, any protector or helper .

124. And whoever performs righteous acts, be a male or female–provided he is a faithful, such will enter Paradise, and not the least injustice will be done to them.

125. And who can be better in religion than one who submits his whole self to Allah, is righteous, and followed the way of Ibrahim, the upright? And Allah did take Ibrahim for a friend²⁰⁶.

126. And whatever is in the heavens and on the earth, belongs to Allah and Allah encompasses all things²⁰⁷.

Commentary

196. For the explanation of Shirk’( Polytheism) please see Note. No.111 , Surah Nisa.

197. That is: Polytheism is an unpardonable sin before Allah, therefore it should be avoided in all circumstances.

198. By invoking is meant invoking for help, for solving some problem, for relieving from distress and difficulty, etc. The polytheists invoke devis (goddesses) because they are under the wrong impression that God has distributed his authority and power to these goddesses. and as such one devi gives wealth another can cure from illness, still another blesses with children and still another goddess can change the misfortune into good fortune Quran shows that first of all these devis and devtas have no existence at all and intellect and nature support this view. All the powers and full control is with Allah. Godhood is an indivisible thing and then to invoke some one for help in difficulties is to consider that being as a god and deserving of worship, while the fact is that there is none worthy of worship except Allah.

“It should be noted that in the mythology of the polytheists, belonging to any country or nation goddesses were given the greatest importance. A glance over the history that is available. of China, India, Arabia, Egypt, Babylon, Nyneveh etc. confirms this view. This point also should be taken note of that all the real needs of life are considered to be connected with these goddesses. In the history of the Non-islamic days of Arabia too, goddesses held their sway over the system of godhood, ‘Laat,’ ‘Manat, ‘Uzza’, etc are the names of their goddesses; these were the idols of the angels. about which the polytheists believed that they were the favourite daughters of God, who never turns down any of their request. For this reason if anything is prayed for through their good offices– and if they are pleased it is sure to be granted.” —(Tadabbur-i-Quran Vol.II. page 160).

It is worth noting that not only polytheists (idolaters) were guilty of the sin of joining partners with Allah, but also the people of the Book were influenced by such practices and were committing the sin.

199. The concept of devi and devta is in reality a deception of Satan and the command of worshipping them is also given by him Therefore, those who, obeying his command, commit polytheism, are really the worshippers of Satan.

200. Satan has been cursed by Allah, therefore he is totally deprived and bereft of good and is evil in his entirety. Whatever thoughts he would put in the human mind would be misleading thoughts. In view of this reality, man should always be alert and wary of Satan and should not be influenced by any evil thoughts that may occur in his mind.

201. This is the saying of Iblees, who is the chief of Satans. He had uttered these words before Allah when Allah had created man and had crowned him with the vicegerency of the earth Iblees was jealous of man, and had obtained Allah’s word to live till the Doomsday, therefore, he declared his plan that he would exercise his control over a very large number of Allah’s slaves, that is human beings.

Satan himself is a helpless creature, created for testing humans, Allah has given satan the ability to mislead humans, hence he braggingly claimed that he would mislead a very large number of humans.This challenge of Satan should not be misunderstood to be a challenge against the godhood of Allah. The fact is that when God expressed his plan to him and he realised that he has gained the authority of misleading humans, he boasted about his plan that he would mislead a very large number of humans.

Allah has not authorized Satan to forcefully lead humans to the wrong path, but he has been, authorized to or rather he has been given the ability to invite humans to the wrong path, to tempt them to commit sin, and to beautify evil. so that in the matter of good and evil humans may be tested.

202. The Devil tries his best to see that man does not become realistic in the matter of religion. Therefore, he involves man in the wrong interpretations about the basic points of religion and gives false hopes of successes. This is the reason why the people, inspite of their being fully involved in committing polytheism, expect good rewards form Allah. And there is no dearth of such persons among Muslims also, who try to cut the very roots of the religion by introducing innovations and absurdities in the religious beliefs and practices, and expect from Allah that he would reward them for this ‘service’ of theirs.

203. The Arab polytheists used to cut or slit the ears of their animals as a token of offering to their gods or goddessess and they used to let such animals go wherever they liked.

204. One example of changing the form of Allah’s creation is that which is quoted above, that is: cutting or slitting the ear of the cattle. Apart from this, there can be many other forms of this, e.g. vasectomy as a means of birth control or family planning, surgery on the calves (legs) for the purpose of beautification, castration, change of sex, men trying to dress and look like women and vice versa, etc. In fact man has no authority to change the form in which Allah has created His creatures, except when the Maker of the Shariah has allowed it, e.g. circumcision, nail-cutting, cutting of the hair in the axilla, etc. which in reality are the demands of nature, or when compelled by the force of circumstances to ampute an arm or a part of the leg, etc. in surgery. Apart from these exceptional cases, to change the form of the Divine creation merely to meet any polytheistic purpose, or under some false theory, or in the name of modern civilization means that we disapprove of the form of our model which our Creator has made, and we want to convert ourselves into a model of our own liking. It is obvious that it amounts to fighting against nature and is the result of the Devil’s machinations.

And those who believe and perform righteous acts. We shall soon admit them to gardens, with rivers flowing beneath, to dwell there forever. Allah’s promise is the truth, and who is truer in his word than Allah ! (Al-Quran)

205. That is: In the Hereafter salvation will not be gained by entertaining false hopes and wishful thinking but there the law of Requital will come into force. In the world people of every religion regard their formal attachment to their own religion sufficient for their salvation, and are under a happy illusion that they are followers of such and such religious leaders and gurus, therefore, all their problems after death have been solved. Muslims have also fallen a prey to this kind of wishful thinking. But Quran warns that mere hopes and desires will not be of any help, the basis on which the judgment will be given in the Hereafter will be man’s own faith and his own acts of righteousness. So any person, who will be found to have performed evil acts in this life, will definitely be punished for that, regardless of the religion to which he has been claiming to attach himself.

206. Being Allah’s friend is a very high honour, which Allah bestowed on Prophet Ibrahim (Abraham), which is also supported by the Bible:

“Jacob whom I liked and who is from the race of My friend, Abraham,” -(Isiah 41 : 8).

207. Points to the fact that Allah’s power is all pervasive and Allah’s knowledge too is all embracing.