حَٰفِظُ

23:10; 70:35.

Important Words:

حافظوا (watch) is derived from حفظ. They say حفظه i.e. he preserved it, or he guarded or protected it, or he prevented it from perishing or becoming lost. حفظ القرآن means, he memorized the Quran, i.e. he learned it by heart. حافظ علی الامر means, he watched over the thing; he attended to it carefully and constantly (Taj).

قانتین (submissively) is derived from قنت for which see 2:117. The word conveys, among others, three important meanings: (1) standing motionless, (2) refraining from speech and (3) standing submissively (Lane). All these meanings are applicable here.

Commentary:

This verse which stresses the importance of, and regularity in, Prayers appears to be rather oddly placed, being wedged in between verses relating to conjugal relations. But the very context of it explains the deep philosophy of its meaning. After marriage one is apt to become a little lax in Prayers, particularly the supererogatory Tahajjud Prayer (said in the latter part of the night). Besides, family life multiplies the cares of both man and woman. Hence, the necessity of urging married people to be regular and punctual in their Prayers.

الصلوة الوسطی (the Middle Prayer) has been differently explained. According to some commentators it is the Tahajjud Prayer, and according to others, it is the morning Prayer, while according to yet others, it is the late afternoon or ‘Asr Prayer. The latter view is supported by some of the sayings of the Holy Prophet. For it is on record that on his missing the right time of the ‘Asr Prayer, when engaged in repelling the repeated attacks of the enemy in the Battle of the Ditch, and having been obliged to combine it with the Maghrib or the sunset Prayer, the Holy Prophet is reported to have said: "May God curse the Jews (who were mostly responsible for this battle)! They have prevented us from saying our Middle Prayer in time" (Bukhari). Truly speaking, however, the "Middle Prayer" is the Prayer which happens to fall within busy hours. In the above-quoted tradition, the Holy Prophet called the ‘Asr the "Middle Prayer," because it fell within extraordinarily busy hours. The Quran has placed this verse here to point out firstly, that married life, and for that matter any life however busy, should not make man slack in the observance of Prayers, and secondly, that like this verse, the Middle Prayer is one which is surrounded by apparently incongruous elements. The style is peculiar to the Quran but is quite natural.

The clause, and stand before Allah submissively, teaches that besides aiming at complete concentration in Prayers the worshipper should observe three special injunctions: (1) he should refrain from speech, (2) he should stand motionless and refrain from making any unnecessary movement, and (3) his general attitude should be that of submissiveness, as lack of these is liable to adversely affect concentration and detract from the sanctity of worship.

33:36.

3:105,111,115; 7:158; 9:71; 31:18.

Important Words:

سائحون (who go about in the land serving Him) is the plural of سائح which is the active participle from ساح which means, it flowed. They say ساح الماء علی وجه الارض i.e. the water flowed or ran freely on the surface of the earth. ساح فی الارض means, he went or journeyed through the land for the purpose of devoting himself to the service of religion, etc. سائح means, one who journeys through or goes about the land as a devotee or otherwise; one who goes forth or journeys through the land to war against disbelievers or to seek knowledge; one who fasts much and keeps to the mosques (Lane).

Commentary:

The present verse, which is a continuation of the previous one, shows that it is the Companions of the Holy Prophet and those who follow them righteously that are meant here.

The noble qualities of believers, as mentioned in the verse under comment, have been put in order of merit. The first stage of spiritual development is that of توبة i.e. repentance of one’s sins. The second stage is that of عبادة i.e. Divine worship, which implies that after having repented of his sins, a Muslim becomes resigned to the Will of God. The third stage is that of حمد i.e. glorifying God, which means that a Muslim is not only resigned to the will of God, but he praises and glorifies Him even in adversity.

The fourth stage pertains to the attribute of سائح which means that in this stage a believer forsakes his home for the sake of God and devotes his whole attention to Him. The fifth spiritual stage which a Muslim attains is that of راکع which signifies that he begins to serve God with all his soul and body, every part of his body being dedicated to His service. See also note on 2:44. In the sixth stage the believer becomes a ساجد (one who falls prostrate before God) which symbolizes the highest stage of nearness to God, when a believer not only severs, as it were, his connection with the world, but also loses his ownself, and throws himself on the earth, mixing with the dust. The Holy Prophet is reported to have said that in the attitude of prostration a believer is in a position of extreme nearness to God.

When a true believer has reached the stage of ساجد i.e. close nearness to God, his next duty is to bring the straying sheep into the fold of the Master. So now he becomes God’s preacher, enjoining what is good and forbidding what is evil. This is the seventh stage to which a true Muslim can and should rise. The next, and in a way the final, stage is that of God’s Khalifah, i.e. Divine Reformer, which is referred to in the words, "Who watch the limits set by God," i.e. those who are, as it were, the guardians of the Law of God. The expression الحافظون لحدود اللّٰه may also mean, those who strictly observe the ordinances of God.

Important Words:

یرتع (he may enjoy himself) is derived from رتع which means, he (a beast) pastured at pleasure, eating and drinking plentifully and pleasantly; he (a man) enjoyed himself, going about cheerfully (Lane).

Commentary:

The words, we shall surely keep guard over him, also show that Joseph at that time was a mere lad of eleven or twelve years of age who required to be looked after and not a grown-up young man of seventeen who could easily take care of himself. See also the preceding verse.

Commentary:

Mark the audacity of Joseph’s brothers revealed in the words, we will surely be able to take care of him. The former spirit of boastfulness still seems to cling to them.

36:70; 65:11.

Commentary:

This verse furnishes a powerful proof of the truth of the Quran and of its Divine origin. In fact, the promise about the preservation of the Quran made in this verse has been so remarkably fulfilled that even if there had been no other proof of the truth of Islam, this alone would have sufficed to establish its Divine origin.

Verse 8 contains the demand mockingly made by disbelievers that if the Quran were really as grand a Book as it was claimed to be, it ought to have descended under the guardianship of angels. This ridicule of disbelievers has been answered in the present verse, which emphatically says that the Quran is indeed a sublime Book and that God Himself has undertaken to act as its Guardian and that He will always protect it against every kind of corruption and interference. And in order that this promise about the protection of the Quran may gain still more force, particles expressive of special emphasis, such as انا (verily We) and نحن (Ourself) and again انا followed by ل (most surely) have been used in this verse. Thus the claim has been made in the most emphatic and forceful language.

The statement that God Himself is the Guardian of the Quran does not mean that angels do not guard it. They also do so, for when the master himself is guarding a thing, the servants must also be necessarily engaged in that service. By saying, most surely We will be its Guardian, God, however, points to the fact that there are certain peculiarities of the Quran which it is beyond the power of angels to guard and, therefore, God Himself has undertaken to do that work.

This Surah was revealed at Mecca. According to Ibn Hisham, it was revealed in the fourth year of the Holy Prophet’s ministry. Sprenger, Rodwell and Nöldeke all agree that it belongs to the Meccan period. Now it is a well-known fact that during the Meccan period, the life of the Holy Prophet and his followers was extremely precarious. They did not even know how to save themselves or where to hide themselves. For no less than three years the Prophet and his few helpless followers were virtually imprisoned in the Shi‘b (valley) of Abu Talib from where they could not venture out. They were under a ban. Is it not then astonishing that when the very lives of Muslims were in peril and the enemy was so strong that he could easily crush the new Faith, disbelievers were challenged to do all that lay in their power to destroy the Quran, and were told that God would frustrate all their designs because He Himself was its Guardian? The challenge was open and unequivocal and the enemy strong and ruthless. But what was the result? The Prophet and his Companions not only remained safe and sound but thrived and prospered and the number of converts continued to swell and the Quran remained safe against all corruption and has ever continued to enjoy perfect security. This distinctive feature of the Quran has not been shared by any other book revealed to any other Prophet.

Sir William Muir, the well-known critic of Islam, says about the Quran: "We may, upon the strongest presumption, affirm that every verse in the Quran is the genuine and unaltered composition of Mohammad himself." Again, "There is otherwise every security, internal and external, that we possess the text which Mohammad himself gave forth and used." Again, "To compare (as the Muslims are fond of doing) their pure text with the various readings of our Scriptures, is to compare things between which there is no analogy." (Introduction to "The Life of Mahomet"). Prof. Nöldeke, the great German Orientalist writes as follows: "Slight clerical errors there may have been, but the Quran of Othman contains none but genuine elements, though sometimes in very strange order. Efforts of European scholars to prove the existence of later interpolations in the Quran have failed." (Enc. Brit.). Professor Nicholson, says in his "Literary History of the Arabs": "Here (in the Quran) we have materials of unique and incontestable authority for tracing the origin and early development of Islam—such mater-ials as do not exist in the case of Buddhism or Christianity or any other ancient religion."

The importance of this security of the Quranic text is further enhanced when we compare it with other revealed Scriptures. The Quran was revealed among an illiterate people, while most other Scriptures were revealed among peoples who were comparatively more literate and therefore better qualified to preserve the purity of their Scriptures. Yet they failed to do so, while the Quran, the most widely read of all revealed Scriptures, enjoys complete immunity from all sorts of corruption. This miraculous preservation of the Quranic text is no mere accident. It has been brought about by the special providence of God in accordance with an openly declared prophecy of the Quran.

The means adopted to safeguard the purity of the text of the Quran have been briefly referred to in verse 2 in the memorable words الکتاب (the Written Book) and قرآن مبین (the Illuminating Recital) signifying: (a) That every verse of the Quran was committed to writing as soon as it was revealed and this writing was most tenaciously preserved. (b) That it was committed to memory as soon as revealed by a number of Muslims. And this pious practice has increasingly continued so much so that in the past centuries hundreds of thousands of Muslims have had the entire Quran literally on the tips of their tongues. Add to this the fact that from the very beginning of Islam the recital of parts of the Quran in the five daily Prayers was made obligatory.

The following additional factors also very materially contributed to the preservation of the Quran:

(1) God has inspired the Muslims with an extraordinary love for the Quran. They enjoy the reading of the Book even if they do not understand the meaning of the text. This leads to its being preserved in their hearts.

(2) The rhythm of the Quran is so sweet and its language so charming and so easy to learn and the construction of its sentences so beautiful that it can be committed to memory with great ease.

(3) God so ordained that immediately after the Quranic revelation became complete, it spread far and wide, to the remotest corners of the world, among all nations and all peoples, so that it became practically impossible for anyone to tamper with its text.

(4) From the beginning the Quran formed for Muslims the basis of all the sciences and learning they acquired and developed with a view to serving it. Various branches of knowledge such as Grammar, Rhetoric, History, Philosophy and Logic were cultivated and developed by Muslims for the sake of a better understanding of their holy Book.

(5) God has preserved Arabic, the language of the Quran, as a living language, while the languages of all other revealed Books, which were not meant to last forever, have become practically dead.

Again, it is not only the text of the Quran that has been preserved intact by God. He has provided for the preservation of its spirit also. This has been done by raising divinely inspired Reformers among the Muslims from time to time. These Reformers, known in Islamic terminology as Mujaddids, receive revelations from God and interpret and explain the true meaning of the Quranic text. Such Reformers appeared among the followers of other religions also, but that was only for so long as such scriptures served as guides for their followers. After the advent of Islam, however, all other religious systems and their scriptures, which were intended only for specific periods and specific peoples, became abrogated and divinely inspired Reformers ceased to appear among them. Now, therefore, the Quran alone among all revealed Scriptures of the world holds the field as a living Book and hence divinely inspired Reformers now appear only among the followers of Islam. In our own time God has raised Ahmad, the Promised Messiah, Founder of the Ahmadiyya Movement, to demon-strate the truth and excellence of the Quran in a manner unparalleled in the history of Islam. Ahmad’s present-ation of Islam is not like one praying for a hearing, as was the vogue among the apologetic school of Muslim writers, but as a victor challenging the protagonists of all other religious systems and the so-called Modernists and Higher Critics to find fault with any teaching of Islam; and also as a judge passing his judgement upon them. The appearance of such Reformers in itself constitutes proof of the living power of a religion and its Scripture inasmuch as they are really the fruit of their religion and their appearance proves its efficacy.

The question here arises, if the Scriptures revealed to the previous Prophets have not been preserved in their original purity, what guarantee is there to believe that the Quran would enjoy permanent security? In this connection it should be noted that the promise of protection made by God in this verse mentions the word الذکر (rendered in the text as "this Exhortation") and not the Quran or any other word; and herein lies the answer to the above question. For, to become deserving of the permanent protection of God it is essential that the Divine revelation should be الذکر of which the necessary attributes are: (1) that it should establish a close and permanent relationship between man and his Maker, inspiring in the former constant remembrance of God, the word ذکر meaning remembering; and (2) that it should elevate man to a state where God may also remember him or in other words favour him with His words and with heavenly help, the word ذکر also means eminence. The verse under comment thus purports to mean that God undertakes to protect any Scripture so long as it serves the above two purposes. But when, through changes in the conditions and circumstances of man, any Scripture ceases to perform these functions and God, in His infallible wisdom, deems it necessary to reveal another Scripture, He naturally ceases to extend His protection to earlier revelations. The question as to when any particular Scripture at any particular time ceases to serve the above-mentioned purposes has to be decided on facts. It is a fact beyond doubt that at the present time no religion other than Islam can claim that there is among its followers anyone who fulfils in his person the conditions mentioned above, viz. attainment of such nearness to God that God begins to speak to him and manifests His special powers for his sake. Such a claim can be made only by a follower of the Quran. As stated above Ahmad, the Promised Messiah, has made this claim in our own time and has proved by powerful heavenly signs that his claim is founded on fact and God is helping his cause wonderfully. It is, therefore, natural that Muslims should claim and believe that now the protection of God is a privilege enjoyed by the Quran alone.

As regards the future, our belief based upon promises made in the Quran is that whenever Muslims forget, or fall away from, the teachings of the Quran, God will, by raising heavenly Reformers, restore to them their faith in its pristine purity. The teachings of the Quran will thus remain effective for all time and will ever continue to enjoy Divine help and protection.

70:30.

Important Words:

فروجھم (their chastity) is the plural of فرج (farjun) which is derived from فرج (faraja). فرج الشیء means, he opened the thing so as to make a gap or breach. فرج means, the pudendum or pudenda; the part or parts of a person which it is indecent to expose; or the external portion of the organs of generation of a man or a woman; an open, wide space; the part between the two sides of a valley, i.e. entrance; a frontier of access to a country (Lane & Aqrab).

Commentary:

This verse refers to the fourth stage in the spiritual development of man. It indeed marks a very high stage. The lesson is writ large on the pages of history that many a nation has gone to rack and ruin because they abandoned themselves to immoral practices. Sexual morality plays a very important part in the building up of the national character of a people. Islam is very keen on this point. It regards the guarding of sexual chastity as one of the most sacred duties of a believer. It has closed the door to all those avenues which lead to moral laxity. The word فرج signifies those avenues through which evil thoughts find access to the human heart. It covers all parts and organs of the body, i.e. eyes, ears, tongue, hands, feet etc. Islam looks with extreme disfavour upon all those practices which are calculated to excite human passions and which are so popular in the west or among people enamoured of western ways of life.

The verse marks a still higher stage in the spiritual development of man than the one mentioned in v. 5 above. It seems much easier to spend one’s money and property in the way of God, to which reference has been made in the preceding verse, than to overcome one’s carnal passions when they once get excited. Man has suffered more from the gratification of his sensual appetites than perhaps from any other evil. The curbing of carnal desires requires a greater mental discipline than the spending of wealth in good causes.

23:6.