What is meant by His saying (Glorified and Exalted is He): “None touch it except the purified”?

The questioner : ... regarding ... .

The Shaykh : And upon you be peace and the mercy of Allah.

The questioner : He said: The purified are the angels ... the pronoun refers to ... the hadith ... it is not permissible ... meaning linking the two events now, regarding the permissibility of touching the Qur'an without ablution; is it permissible ... to recite the Qur'an?

The Shaykh : Did Professor Mahmoud not bring anything new that was not preceded by the previous scholars in his interpretation of the verse: first, and in his position regarding the permissibility of reciting the Qur'an or touching the Qur'an for one who is not in a state of purity, and all of this has been preceded by others.
And this is in reality part of the nature of the Salafi methodology, and among its conditions is that the Salafi call does not adopt an opinion in a matter that has been practiced in some way, or an opinion among the opinions; the Salafis do not adopt an opinion that has not been preceded by others, but their path, plan, and methodology is only =

The questioner: Peace be upon you.

The Shaykh : And upon you be peace and the mercy of Allah and His blessings, put them there behind you.
= only the selection of one of the opinions that were said; whether that is in the legal rulings or in the interpretation of the noble verses, so the interpretation of the verse: that they are the noble angels is a precedent interpretation =

The questioner: Peace be upon you.

The Shaykh : And upon you be peace, and the mercy of Allah and His blessings.
= a precedent interpretation; so the Salafis, from the side of a group of scholars, led by Imam Malik ibn Anas, the Imam of the City of Migration, mentioned in his famous book "Al-Muwatta" that he said: The best I have heard in the interpretation of this verse: is that it is like the verse in Surat 'Abasa: , are the purified in the first verse: , and so the Qur'an interprets part of itself with another part.
And Imam Malik has among the Imams the merit of being the first to draw our attention to the fact that the verse is interpreted by His saying (Blessed and Exalted is He) in the previous verse: .
And among the scholars who interpreted the verse with the scientific and simplified interpretation mentioned previously is the famous researcher Ibn al-Qayyim al-Jawziyyah; for he has a delightful book titled "Categories of the Qur'an" in which he addressed in his interpretation of this verse His saying (Glorified and Exalted is He) before it: "And it is indeed a noble Qur'an."

Eid Abbasi : .

The Shaykh : And it is?

Eid Abbasi : .

The Shaykh, so on the occasion of His saying (Blessed and Exalted is He): , Ibn al-Qayyim addressed the interpretation of this verse in that book "Categories of the Qur'an," so he mentioned many aspects supporting that in the verse are only the angels; some of those aspects come to my mind now, among them:
First: He says that Allah (Mighty and Majestic) said: , and He did not say: except those who purify themselves, and from the perspective of Arabic style, there is a great difference between the purified (al-mutahharun) and those who purify themselves (al-mutatahhirun), so the purified is one who is purified by creation and nature, and those are none but the angels whom our Lord (Blessed and Exalted is He) described with His saying: , as for us, the people of humankind, we are not purified, but we are of two types: a group that becomes defiled and then purifies itself; these are the beloved of Allah (Blessed and Exalted is He) as He said in the famous verse: ; because the one who purifies himself is the one who seeks purity and strives for it and acts according to the requirement of purifying himself by repenting to Allah and performing the expiations of righteous deeds, as for the angels, they do not become defiled until they purify themselves, but rather they are, since our Lord (Blessed and Exalted is He) created them, as He said: .
So when we return with this to the verse under discussion and we observe that Allah (Mighty and Majestic) says: , it becomes clear to us that the intended meaning is the angels and not humans; because we know from the other verse that when Allah intended humans, He said: , ; so this is evidence or one of the aspects upon which Ibn al-Qayyim relied in affirming that the intended meaning of the verse is the angels only.
Another aspect is the aspect you quoted from Professor Mahmoud, here the pronoun , to what does it refer? Many people think it refers to the Mushaf which contains the Qur'an between its two covers, so Ibn al-Qayyim refutes this with the argument that the Mushaf was not mentioned previously in the context of those verses, but rather a Book described by His saying: , "Indeed, it is a hidden Book" was mentioned previously.

Eid Abbasi : ... .

The Shaykh, so a Book described as being hidden, this description does not apply to the Mushaf that is in our hands because it is apparent and not hidden; because the intended meaning of hidden is concealed, so what is the Book to which this description of being hidden applies? It is the one whose mention also came in another verse: "A noble Qur'an" , this Preserved Tablet is the hidden Book; so the pronoun returns to this hidden Book.
And this opinion is supported by the aforementioned Imam Malik where he said: , so these noble, righteous ones are those who touch this hidden Book which is in the Preserved Tablet; that is: the meaning of the verse: that is: the origin of this Book that is in our hands, its origin is the hidden, preserved one which hands do not reach except the hands of the angels; this Book is the one , this is one aspect.
And there is another aspect he also mentions, saying: His saying (Glorified and Exalted is He): is a declarative sentence, and the news of Allah does not delay or fail, it cannot be contrary to reality, and if Allah (Mighty and Majestic) intended from the verse this Mushaf that is in our hands, we know by observation that it is touched by those who are not purified, certainly, from the Muslims who, first of all, do not see the obligation of purity in touching the Qur'an, like us, and from the Muslims who see the obligation of purity but they are lazy and do not care like those who call for abandoning all the obligatory duties, so it is even more fitting for them to abandon purifying themselves for the mere purpose of what? Touching the Qur'an.
And finally come the disbelievers who do not believe in the origin of the entire Qur'an; so they touch the Qur'an in a state of major ritual impurity; because they are always not purified; so how can all of this be reality while Allah (Blessed and Exalted is He) informs and says: ? One of two things: either the news of Allah is not correct because it is contrary to reality, or our understanding of the news of Allah is a wrong understanding; so this wrong understanding is what actually collided with reality, not the news of Allah; because the news of Allah does not fail or delay, so if the matter revolves between accusing Allah of informing contrary to reality and accusing our minds, thoughts, and understandings of a wrong understanding; what do we choose? Without doubt, we choose the latter; because it is not permissible for a believer in Allah and His Messenger to think or to have it cross his mind that it is permissible for Allah to inform contrary to reality.
Since the matter is so, nothing remains but that the meaning of the verse is not as people think; because this meaning contradicts reality, He said (Glorified and Exalted is He): so we understood that the purified are the Muslims who purify themselves, so we saw these Muslims touching it while they are not purified; so this understanding is the error; because Allah does not err, so what is the correct meaning? The correct meaning we knew from what preceded is that the purified in the verse are the angels and not humans; at that time, the verse did not collide with reality.
This is if we understand—and this is the reality—that the verse is a declarative sentence; it is an announcement from Allah that the hidden book . It might be said here that it is possible to say that the verse is a declarative sentence, but the intended meaning is command and volition; that is, the verse is a negation meaning prohibition. However, the objection to this is that the principle is that one should not resort to such an interpretation unless it is impossible to understand it as a purely declarative sentence. If it can be understood in the established way, the verse remains declarative and contains no element of volition. When we look at these details, all of which Ibn al-Qayyim articulated in his aforementioned book "Categories of the Qur'an," it becomes clear to us that the correct interpretation of this verse is that it has no connection to the issue of touching the Qur'an without ritual purity. Rather, it is a declarative sentence in which Allah (Mighty and Majestic) informs us that the hidden book, preserved in the Preserved Tablet, is not touched by the hands of the devils, as He (the Exalted) said: . Rather, it is touched and brought down by the honored angels, .
This is with regard to the issue of touching the Qur'an.