Exegesis of the saying of Allah the Exalted: “That is better for you with your Creator, so He turned to you in mercy. Indeed, He is the Accepter of Repentance, the Merciful.”

Moses said: . “That” refers to the killing. Here he said: , and did not say: “That.” Why?
The student: Because it is like a plural.

The Shaykh : No, that is wrong, wrong. Pay attention. He said and did not say “that,” and it does not refer to a group?
The student: He is addressing the group and referring to a single thing.

The Shaykh : Correct. He is addressing the group and referring to a single thing, which is the killing. The thing referred to is singular, masculine, and it is the killing. The ones being addressed are a group, and they are his people. They are his people . His saying: means better than not repenting or better than not killing. This is a form of preference where the other party has nothing of that kind. Do you understand? Preference where the other party has nothing of that kind is valid in the Arabic language. However, some say that the name of preference is omitted here, and it serves as evidence of the goodness in this matter without estimating the thing being compared to. Yes? For example, here someone might ask: If they had not killed themselves, would there have been goodness in that? There is no goodness in that. So why did he say: ? We say there are two answers. One is that this is a case of preference where the party being compared to has nothing of that kind, like His saying: , which is a better resting place than the people of the Fire, even though the people of the Fire have no goodness in their resting place. And some say that here it is not a name of preference for this reason, but rather it is a description of the thing’s goodness only, and it is not a case of the preferred and the preferred over in any way .
Then Allah the Exalted said: What do we say? We say: Allah the Exalted said: . Is this the point of mentioning the blessing or not? Because the first part: mentioned the sin and repentance from it. But the blessing is by what? By Allah’s turning to them in mercy. Therefore He said: . And Allah’s turning to His servant in mercy means that He is pleased with him after anger, and He accepts him after turning away from him and ignoring him. Yes? Or is it ? This is from the speech of Allah. No, no, no. I am mentioning the blessing of Allah when He said: . This is from the speech of Allah.
And His saying: . What is the meaning of “turned to you in mercy”? He accepted you after He had been turning away from you. Or the meaning is “turned to you in mercy” meaning He accepted the repentance, He accepted the repentance from you. And the necessary consequence of accepting their repentance is that Allah accepts them.
Then Allah the Exalted said: . “He” is a demonstrative pronoun, and some grammarians call it a pillar pronoun because the predicate depends on it. It is a demonstrative pronoun because it separates the attribute from the predicate.
We have mentioned that there are three benefits in it. Who can mention them? The demonstrative pronoun has three benefits that we mentioned previously. What are they, Ya Saleh? That is, separation, restriction, and the third is emphasis. Yes. And His saying: is a form of exaggeration, and He did not say “the Repentant.” Yes? Because “the Repentant” indicates the action in general, but “the Accepter of Repentance” indicates its frequency. And Allah, Glorified and Exalted is He, is frequent in repentance due to the frequency of His repentance toward His servant, and frequent in repentance due to the frequency of the people who repent to Him. So He repents repeatedly toward His servant, and He repents for the many people whose repentance is frequent. For this reason, the attribute “the Accepter of Repentance” was used.
And His saying: means the One possessing the mercy that reaches the one being shown mercy. The One possessing the mercy that reaches the one being shown mercy, because here it is a descriptive attribute, but it indicates the action, meaning that Allah the Exalted is Merciful, meaning He is merciful in reality.
Now, the repentance of Allah, Glorified and Exalted is He, and describing Allah with repentance, it should be known that Allah’s repentance toward the servant is of two types: repentance preceding the servant’s repentance, and repentance following it. As for His repentance preceding the servant’s repentance, it is His enabling him to repent. And as for His repentance following the servant’s repentance, it is the acceptance of the repentance. Allah the Exalted said: until He said: . Yes. Before that: . Yes?

The questioner : Shaykh, yes?