مُطْمَئِنّ

3:91; 4:138; 63:4.

Commentary:

With this verse the Quran reverts to the main theme of the Surah, viz. that the day of the glory of Islam is about to dawn but Muslims will have to suffer great trials and tribulations to deserve it. They are warned that if anyone of them recanted under these trials, he would draw upon himself the wrath of God. But a person who is inwardly satisfied with Islam and only under very severe compulsion is constrained to utter words which may appear to express disbelief, may not be punished for such an expression of disbelief. But this does not mean that cowardice is condoned or that such a person will be altogether pardoned. Cowardice and true belief cannot go together. The verse holds out no Divine pardon to a coward. It is indeed silent about him which implies that final judgement in the case of such persons has been reserved and that their future behaviour will determine the nature of the treatment they will receive from God.

The words, who is forced thereto, may refer to Jabr or ‘Ammar bin Yasir but preferably to the former.

23:25; 25:22; 43:61.

Commentary:

It is clear from this verse that what is here meant by "angels" are not real angels but angel-like men, because real angels certainly would not need other angels to come as Warners to them.

The verse constitutes an effective answer to those people who in their arrogance say that, being superior to their Prophet, they should have received revelation direct from God. They are told that angels descend upon angel-like men, and not upon their opposites and that if they bring about an angelic change in their lives, angels would begin to descend upon them.

But as they have allied themselves with Satan they could not expect visits from angels. The verse also provides an answer to another class of men who believe that man is too puny and inconsequential a being to be the recipient of Divine revelation and that higher beings are required for this purpose. The answer given is that only beings of the same species can help their prototypes achieve their salvation, because only they can serve as exemplars or models for them. Thus none but a man could be the bearer of a Divine Message for mankind, because only a man could serve as a model for other men. The word رسول (Messenger) here does not mean simply the bearer of Divinerevelation, but the possessor of all the attributes and qualifications of a Divine Messenger.

Commentary:

The last four verses of the Surah constitute a befitting climax. They purport to say that he who acquires the prerequisites for full moral development, mentioned in the foregoing verses, becomes immune to all possibility of faltering or falling. He attains the highest stage of spiritual development; "he is well pleased with his Lord and his Lord is well pleased with him." At this stage, called the heavenly stage, man is freed from all weakness and frailty and is braced with a peculiar spiritual strength. He becomes "united" with God and cannot exist without Him. As water flows with great force down a slope and, on account of its great mass and the total absence of all obstacles, dashes down with irresistible force, so the God-intoxicated man, at this stage, casting off all trammels, becomes attracted unrestrainedly towards his Maker. It is in this life and not after death that this great transformation takes place in him and it is in this world and not elsewhere that access to Paradise is granted to him. He finds his support only in God; He drinks deep at this fountain of spiritual life and is delivered from death.