Period of Revelation
From the style of the Sura it appears that it was sent down during the middle Makkah
period
more particularly in its initial stage
for one does not find in its background that severity of the persecution and tyranny
which one finds in the Suras sent down in the later stages.
Theme and Topics
The main theme of the Sura is to remove the doubts of the people concerning Tauhid
the Hereafter and thc Prophethood
and to invite them to all these three realities. The disbelievers of Makkah
when they talked of the Holy Prophet in private
said to one another
This person is forging strange things sometimes he gives news of what will happen
after death. He says: when you have become dust
you will be called to render your accounts
and there will be Hell and Heaven. Sometimes he says: these gods and goddesses and
saints are nonentities: One God alone is the Deity. And sometimes he says: the
discourses which I recite are not my own but Allah's Word. All these are strange things
which he presents.
The answer to these doubts and misgivings forms the theme and subject matter of this
Sura. In this connection
the disbelievers have been told: "Most certainly it is Allah's Word
which has been sent down in order to arouse a people who are sunk in heedlessness
being deprived of the bounties and blessings of Prophethood. How can you call it a
fabrication when its having been sent dawn from Allah is manifest and selfevident?"
Then
they have been asked
Use your common sense and judge for yourselves which of the things presented by the
Quran is strange and novel?Look at the administration of the heavens and the earth:
consider your own creation and structure. Don't these things testify to the teaching
which this Prophet is presenting before you in the Quran? Does the system of the
universe point to Tauhidor to shirk? When you consider this whole system and your
own creation
does your intellect testify that the One Who has given you your present existence
will not be able to create you once again?
Then a scene of the Hereafter has been depicted
the fruits of belief and the evil consequences of disbelief have heen mentioned and the
people exhorted to give up disbelief even before they meet their doom and accept the
teaching of the Quran
which will be to their own advantage in the Hereafter. Then they have been told: It is
Allah's supreme Mercy that He does not seize man immediately for his errors to punish
him finally and decisively but warns him beforehand by afflicting him with small troubles
and hardships and calamiaes and losses and strokes of misfortune so that he may
wake up and take admonition. Then it is said: "This is not the first and novel event of its
kind that a Book has becn sent down upon a man from God. Before this the Book had
been sent upon Moses also
which you all know. There is nothing strange in this at which you should marvel. Be
assured that this Book has come down from God
and note it well that the same will happen now as has already happened in the time of
Moses. Leadership now will be bestowed only on those who will accept this Divine
Book. Those who reject it shall be doomed to failure." Then the disbelievers of Makkah
have been admonished to the effect:"See the end of the doomed communities of the
past by whose ruined habitations you pass during your trade journeys. Will you like to
meet the same doom yourself?Do not be deluded by the apparent and superficial.
Today you see that no one is listening to Muhammad (upon whom be Allah's peace)
except a few young men and some slaves and poor men
and he is being made the target of curses and ugly remarks from every side. From this
you have formed the wrong impression that his mission will fail. But this is only a
deception of your eyes. Don't you see the phenomenon in your daily life that a land
previously lying absolutely barren starts swelling with vegetation and plant life
everywhere just by a single shower of the rain though before this no one could ever
imagine that under the layers of its soil there lay hidden such treasures of greenery and
herbage?" In conclusion
the Holy Prophet has been addressed to the effect: "These people mock at what you
say and ask as to when you will attain this decisive victory. Tell them: when the time
comes for the
