23. What is meant to be said hare is: When they will be rounded up to be presented in the Court of Allah, though the words used are to the effect: When they will be gathered to be driven to Fire of Hell, for Hell in any case will be their final destination.

24. That is, All the former and latter generations and races will be gathered together at a time and called to account together. For, whatever a person does in his lifetime, whether good or evil, its influence and impact does not end with his life but continues to operate even after his death for long periods of time, for which he is totally responsible. Likewise, whatever a generation does in its own time, its influence continues to affect the later generations for centuries, and it is responsible for its heritage. It is inevitable to examine all these influences and their results and to collect their evidences. For that very reason, generation after generation of the people will go on arriving and will be withheld. The court will start its work when all the former and latter generations will have assembled together in the Plain of Resurrection. (For further explanation, see( Surah Al-Aaraf, Ayats 38-39 and E.N. 30) on it.

25. The explanation of this given in the Hadith is that when a stubborn culprit will go on denying his crimes, and will even belie all the witnesses, then the limbs of his body will bear the witness, one after the other, by the command of Allah, and will tell what offenses he had committed through them. This thing has been reported by Anas, Abu Musa Ashari, Abu Said Khudri and Ibn Abbas from the Prophet (peace be upon him), and traditionists like Muslim, Nasai, Ibn Jarir, Ibn Abi Hatim, Bazzar and others have related these in their books. (For further explanation, see (E.N. 55 of Surah YaSeen).

This verse is one of those many verses which prove that the Hereafter will not only be a spiritual world but human beings will be resurrected with the body and soul as they are now in this world. Not only this: they will be given the same body in which they live now. The same particles and atoms which composed their bodies in the world will be collected on the Day of Resurrection, and they will be resurrected with the same previous bodies in which they had lived and worked in the world. Evidently, the limbs of man can bear the witness in the Hereafter only in case they are the same limbs with which he committed a crime in his previous life. This subject is borne out decisively and absolutely by the following verses of the Quran: (Surah Bani-Israil, Ayats 49-51, 98); (Surah Al-Muminun, Ayats 35- 38, (82-83); (Surah An-Noor, Ayat 24); (Surah As-Sajdah, Ayat 10); (Surah YaSeen, Ayats 65, 78, 79); (Surah As-Saafat, Ayats 16-18); (Surah Al-Waqiah, Ayats 47-50); (Surah An-Naziat, Ayats 10-14).

26. This shows that not only man’s own limbs will bear witness on the Day of Resurrection, but every such thing before which man would have committed any crime will also speak out. The same thing has been said in Surah Al- Zilzal, thus: The earth will cast out all the burdens, which lie within it, and man will say: what has befallen it? On that Day shall it relate whatever had happened (on it), because your Lord will have commanded it (to do so). (verses 2-5).

27. Hasan Basri has explained this verse thus: Every man’s attitude and conduct is determined by the thought and conjecture that he has about his God. The conduct of a righteous believer is right because his thought and conjecture about his Lord is right, and the conduct of a disbeliever and a hypocrite and a sinful person is wrong because his thought and conjecture about his Lord is wrong. This same theme has the Prophet (peace be upon him) expressed in a comprehensive and brief Hadith, thus: Your Lord says: I am with the thought and conjecture that My servant holds about Me. (Bukhari, Muslim).

28. It can also mean this: If they would want to return to the world, they would not be able to return, and this: If they would want to come out from Hell, they would not be able to come out of it, and this: If they would want to offer an excuse or repentance, it would not be accepted.

29. This is the permanent and eternal way of Allah that He dots not let the men with evil intentions and desires have good companions, but lets them have bad companions according to their own inclinations. Then, as they go on descending into the depths of vice, more and more evil and wicked men and devils go on joining them as their associates and advisers and companions. Some people’s saying that so-and-so is himself a very good man but happens to have bad companions is, in fact, contrary to fact. The law of nature is that every man gets the same sort of friends as he himself is. If bad people happen to be associated with a good man, they cannot remain associated with him for long. Likewise, if good and noble men happen to be associated with evil intentioned and immoral men by chance, their association cannot last long. An evil man naturally attracts only evil men to himself and only evil men become attracted towards him just as filth attracts flits and flits are attracted by the filth.

The meaning of: “Who have made attractive for them what was before them and what was behind them” is this: They assured them that their past had been glorious and their future would also be bright. They made them see everything attractive and pleasant on every side. They told them that those who criticized them were foolish because they were not doing anything novel or strange. Those who had made any progress in the world before them had been doing the same that they were doing. Ahead of them there was no Hereafter at all in which they might have to be called to account for their deeds. But if at all, the Hereafter did take place, as some foolish people assert it would, the God who was blessing them in the world would bless them there too. Hell had not been made for them but for those whom God had deprived of His blessings here.