Surah Al-Anfal 8:1-10 - Quran Translation Commentary

1.They ask you about the spoils of war. Say: “The spoils of war belong to Allah and the messenger. So fear Allah and keep straight the relations between yourselves, and obey Allah and His messenger, if you are believers.”

2. The believers are only those whose hearts are filled with awe² at the mention of Allah, and whose faith grows stronger when His revelations are recited to them³, and they put their trust in their Lord⁴;

3. Who establish salat ⁵ (prayer), and spend (in Our way) of that which We have given them⁶.

4. Such in reality are the true believers. For them are the grades of honour with their Lord, and forgiveness and bountiful provision.

5. (And the events at Badr took place, in the same way), as your Lord brought you forth from your home (Madina towards Badr) with the truth, while a group among the believers were averse to it⁷,

6. Disputing with you about the truth, even after it had been made manifest, as if they were being driven to death, and they were seeing it ⁸, (with their own eyes).

7. And when Allah had promised you one of the two bands that it should be yours⁹, and you wished that the unarmed one might be yours¹⁰; while Allah willed¹¹ to establish the truth according to his words and to cut off the roots of unbelievers ¹².

8. So that He might justify the truth and prove falsehood to be false, however, distasteful it might be to the guilty¹³.

9. when you were appealingly praying to your Lord¹⁴, He answered: “I will help you with a chain of thousand angels.”

10. And Allah made this a glad tiding (for you¹⁵), and (He gave this glad tiding to you) so that your hearts might be reassured, for help comes only from Allah¹⁶. Verily Allah is Mighty, Wise.

Commentary

2. That is: The people of faith are so warm hearted, keen and sensitive in their love for God that whenever His name is mentioned, their hearts are filled with awe by the thought of His greatness. The other name for such a state is ‘taqwa ‘.

3. The real connection of faith is with the heart, and if care is taken to develop the state of faith that is generated in the heart, then it will be seen that it grows stronger with regularity. Recitation of the Verses of Quran with understanding their sense and meaning results in strengthening faith.

4. That is: Their real trust is not in provisions and equipments but in Allah. For waging a war, they provide themselves with whatever equipment they can collect and also employ the best possible strategies. and in spite of all this they do not think that their success depends on their equipments or their strategies; they think that their success depends on the help that would come from Allah. Similarly, when they receive Allah’s command to fight. they do not hesitate on account of shortage of equipment. but they enter the fray even when they are most ill-equipped; and they think that the outcome is in the hands of Allah.

5. The significance of this aspect of prayer (salat) in connection with jihad makes it clear that, that army of Muslims which does not establish prayer is utterly useless for bringing in the Islamic revolution.

6. Refers to the fact that people fighting in the way of Allah are not mercenary soldiers. nor do they have any material benefits as their goals. but they spend their own money and sacrifice everything they possess.

7. This Verse clarifies that the prophet (Sallal Lahu Alaihi Wa Sallam). left Madina under the command of Allah. and his leaving Madina was for the purpose of establishing truth. that is he had not left Madina for any worldly objective or for plundering or merely shedding blood. but the objective was to prove the truth of the dawah of monotheism and of his prophethood. And this objective could not be achieved by attacking the trading caravan. but only by confronting the army of the infidels. Therefore, when he left Madina. he advanced with the idea of reaching Badr only. But a group of Muslims did not like the idea of challenging the infidel army. They wanted to attack the trading caravan which was travelling from Syria to Makkah. because it was easier to overpower the caravan than win against the army.

8. This event took place before their coming, out of Madina. When the Prophet (Sallal Lahu Alaihi Wa Sallam) informed the Muslims that Abu Sufyan has left Syria on his way to Makkah with his trading caravan. and the army of the disbelievers was advancing towards Badr from Makkah. and that they would be confronted with either of the two groups. a section of the Muslims were inclined to attack the trading caravan. Later on when the prophet clearly told them that they have to fight the army of the disbelievers. so that a final decision between truth and falsehood might come out. some of the Muslims who were weakened, felt that fighting against such a large and well-armed army of the infidels in such an ill-equipped condition would be nothing short of inviting their own death. Therefore’. they tried to argue with the Prophet in this matter, they were insisting that the Muslims should advance towards the caravan instead of towards the army. This attitude of theirs is criticized here.

9. That is: you will overpower the caravan or the army. This was the promise of Allah, about which the prophet (Sallal lahu Alaihi, Wa Sallam) had already informed the Muslims. For tactical reasons the point was kept vague, but subsequently before the Muslim army set out from Madina. the prophet had informed the Muslims that they were going to fight the infidel army, so that the people of faith might come out fully prepared for fighting.

It may be noted that some errors have been committed by narrators and biographers in relating the events in their proper order. For this reason, a correct picture of the events is not presented before our eyes, e.g. this statement of the biographer. Ibn Ishaq that the prophet had set out with the objective of attacking the caravan, and subsequently he informed the people that the fighting would be against the army. The relating of the events in the wrong sequence has given a chance to the opponents of Islam to raise objections. But the statement of the Quran referred to herein refutes this objection. since it is clearly mentioned here that the fighting would be against the army was made known before setting out from Madina. and that is why a section of the Muslims did not like taking up arms against the infidel army and they had entered into an argument with the prophet. Therefore. these narratives should be viewed in the light of what is stated by Quran and the statement of Quran should not be viewed in the light of these narratives.

It may also be noted that even if the Muslims were to attack the trade caravan, it would not have been a wrongful act, for the Quraish were at war with the Muslims and in conditions of war to attack the caravans of the enemy to weaken him is not an objectionable thing. And if at all it were an objectionable thing, Quran would not have stated: one of the two bands, that it should be yours,” but it would have said that the army should be yours. But since by overpowering the caravan the distinction between the truth and the falsehood would not have become manifest, and misunderstanding could have been created that the objective of the Muslims was only to plunder the caravan, Allah did not let the caravan to come under the Muslims’ attack and caused the army to be confronted by them, and when with the help from Allah the Muslims were victorious, it was amply proved that the plan of the battle which was drawn by the prophet was absolutely correct, and this had happened under the guidance and support of Allah.

10. By the unarmed ones is meant the trade caravan. Since this trade caravan consisted of only forty persons, it would have been possible to overpower it without any resistance.

11. That is: By His commands.

12. It is obvious that this objective could be achieved by fighting only.

13. That is: To the disbelievers.

14. The Muslims had prayed to God for His help, and the prophet (Sallal Lahu Alaihi Wa Sallam) spent the whole night praying to Allah, and even during the daytime these words were on his lips: “O God! Fulfil the promise that You have made, and grant us the thing which You have promised.

O God! If this band of handful people is destroyed today, then there will be none to worship You. – (Muslim – kitabul Jihad).

15. That is: The tiding of the descending of the angels that was given to you did not mean that the angels would come and fight on your behalf and that you were not to fight the infidels and put your lives in danger, but giving a good tiding to you only meant that if you stood up firmly against the disbelievers and were prepared to stake your lives in the fighting, then to make you stand firm, to boost your morale, and to make your strikes effective on such an emergent occasion Allah would help you, as has been made clear in Verse No. 12. And this was a great help from Allah, because the army whose morale is high and whose soldiers are ready to stake their lives cannot be defeated by its opponent. That is the reason why in the Battle of Badr, where Muslims were outnumbered in the proportion of 1: 3 defeated the enemy, but if the purpose of sending down the angels was to fight directly against the infidels, then in such a case only one angel would have sufficed. But this is not the tradition of Allah. The clash of the truth and falsehood is a great trial for the parties concerned. The followers of falsehood get an opportunity to express their worst passions and the followers of truth to show their merit. But since the followers of truth are scantily armed, ill- equipped and less in number, Allah sends His angels to assist them, and so far as the Divine help is concerned, it is always with the followers of truth, whether their number may be small or large.

16. That is: Even if this glad tiding were not given them, they should be reassured that Allah’s help would definitely come, and whenever help comes. it is always from Allah. Angels themselves do not help anybody, but when they get a command from Allah they arrive to assist the needy.