Explanation of the Author's Statement: Chapter: The Saying of Allah the Exalted: "Have you not seen those who claim that they have believed in what has been revealed to you and what was revealed before you, desiring to

The Reciter: "Chapter: The Saying of Allah the Exalted:

⁽⁶⁰⁾ Have you not seen those who claim to have believed in what was revealed to you, [O Muhammad], and what was revealed before you? They wish to refer legislation to Taghut, while they were commanded to reject it; and Satan wishes to lead them far astray. ⁽⁶¹⁾ And when it is said to them, "Come to what Allah has revealed and to the Messenger," you see the hypocrites turning away from you in aversion. ⁽⁶²⁾ So how [will it be] when disaster strikes them because of what their hands have put forth and then they come to you swearing by Allah, "We intended nothing but good conduct and accommodation."

ألم تر إلى الذين يزعمون أنهم آمنوا بما أنزل إليك وما أنزل من قبلك يريدون أن يتحاكموا إلى الطاغوت وقد أمروا أن يكفروا به ويريد الشيطان أن يضلهم ضلالا بعيداً وإذا قيل لهم تعالوا إلى ما أنزل الله وإلى الرسول رأيت المنافقين يصدون عنك صدودا فكيف إذا أصابتهم مصيبة بما كسبت أيديهم ثم جاؤوك يحلفون بالله إن أردنا إلا إحسانا وتوفيقا

[An-Nisa 4:60-62]

, and His saying:

And when it is said to them, "Do not cause corruption on the earth," they say, "We are but reformers."

وإذا قيل لهم لا تفسدوا في الأرض قالوا إنما نحن مصلحون

[Al-Baqarah 2:11]

and His saying:

And cause not corruption upon the earth after its reformation. And invoke Him in fear and aspiration. Indeed, the mercy of Allah is near to the doers of good.

ولا تفسدوا في الأرض بعد إصلاحها وادعوه خوفا وطمعا إن رحمة الله قريب من المحسنين

[Al-A'raf 7:56]

, and His saying:

Then is it the judgement of [the time of] ignorance they desire? But who is better than Allah in judgement for a people who are certain [in faith].

أفحكم الجاهلية يبغون ومن أحسن من الله حكما لقوم يوقنون

[Al-Ma'idah 5:50]

".

The Shaykh : In the name of Allah, the Most Gracious, the Most Merciful.
He said, may Allah have mercy on him: "Chapter: The Saying of Allah the Exalted

Have you not seen those who claim

ألم تر إلى الذين يزعمون

[An-Nisa 4:60]

" to the end of it.
This chapter has a strong connection to the one before it, because it contains the condemnation of those who desire to seek judgment from other than Allah and His Messenger, while the one before it explains the ruling of those who obey scholars or rulers in making lawful what Allah has forbidden or forbidding what Allah has made lawful. Look at His saying, the Exalted: This interrogative is intended for affirmation and wonder at their condition, affirming what they are upon and wondering at this state, and the address in His saying: returns to the Messenger, peace and blessings be upon him, due to His saying: , and here the address must be for the Messenger, peace and blessings be upon him. And His saying: He did not say "to those who believed," because they did not believe, but they claim it, and they are liars claiming it while they are liars. And His saying: , in what was revealed to you, which is the Book and the wisdom, as Allah the Exalted said: , and the wisdom, the exegetes said, is the Sunnah. These people claim, saying: We believe in Allah, we believe in the Qur'an, we believe in the Sunnah, but their actions contradict their words. How? , meaning: This is their desire, and this is their passion, that they desire to seek judgment by the taghut, they do not desire to seek judgment by Allah and His Messenger, but by the taghut. And the taghut, as mentioned previously, is an intensive form of transgression, so it contains aggression and tyranny. And what is meant by the taghut here is every ruling that contradicts the ruling of Allah and His Messenger, or every judge who judges by other than what Allah and His Messenger revealed, by other than what Allah revealed to His Messenger. This is the taghut, because everyone who judges by other than the Book of Allah and the Sunnah of His Messenger, peace and blessings be upon him, and considers that the ruling must be according to what he says, is a tyrant who transgresses, lowering himself to what he does not deserve. Is that clear? So what is the taghut? The taghut is everyone who judges by other than what Allah revealed. This is the taghut, because the discussion now is about judgment. Ibn al-Qayyim, may Allah have mercy on him, defined the taghut with the broader meaning, saying: "It is everything by which a servant exceeds his limit, whether it is an object of worship, a follower, or an obeyed one".
Meaning the command is not ambiguous and not hidden from them, rather they have been commanded to disbelieve in it. And the one who is commanded to disbelieve in something, then desires to seek judgment by it, is this verse from him with knowledge or with ignorance and concealment? It is with knowledge. They have been made clear the matter, and they were commanded to disbelieve in this taghut, and to disbelieve in every ruling that contradicts the Book of Allah and the Sunnah of His Messenger, peace and blessings be upon him, but despite that, and may Allah protect us, they desire nothing but this.
Allah the Exalted said: Satan desires. Is the Satan here a proper noun or a generic term? It is a generic term, encompassing the devils of mankind and the devils of the jinn.
Allah the Exalted said: , so what is meant by Satan is the generic term, the devils of mankind and the jinn. Satan desires to lead them astray in a far-reaching error, meaning: to cause them to fall into misguidance, the misguidance far from the truth. But this does not necessitate that he transfers them from the truth to falsehood in one sudden leap, rather he lures them gradually, step by step, and paves the ways for them, because Satan knows that if they judged by what contradicts the truth in one sudden leap, would they accept it or not? They would not accept it. But he paves the way for them, and desires to lead them astray in a far-reaching error, not a near one, but gradually, step by step, until he causes them to fall into far-reaching misguidance.
Glory be to Allah, the Qur'an interprets some of it by some of it. , The Qur'an, and to the Messenger, to the Messenger himself in his lifetime, and to his Sunnah after his death. But we said the address here is for the Messenger, peace and blessings be upon him, so what is meant by His saying: is to the Messenger himself. , His saying: means: seeing their condition, not seeing with the eyes, because they are not with the Messenger, peace and blessings be upon him. It is possible that they are with him and it is said to them: Come to what Allah revealed and to the Messenger, but the word "Come to what Allah revealed and to the Messenger" indicates that they are not present with him. So His saying: means seeing their condition, not seeing with the eyes, meaning as if you are watching them.
And His saying: This is like the knowledge of most of you, an explicit mention in the place of an implicit one. The context required saying: I saw them turning away from you with a turning away, but he said: and in this explicit mention in the place of the implicit one, there are two benefits. The first benefit: that these who claim that they believed were hypocrites, they claim that they believed but they did not believe. Second: that such a state does not come from anyone but a hypocrite, and that whoever is in this state, even until the Day of Resurrection, is a hypocrite, because the true believer must submit to the command of Allah and the command of His Messenger, whatever the command is.
He said... wrong, yes, pay attention.
His saying: This is the answer to "if," meaning as soon as this speech is said to them, they turn away.
The word "turn away" is used as intransitive and transitive. If it is intransitive, the verbal noun is "turning away" (suduud), yasadu yasadu suduudan, like yaq'adu yaq'udu quwwudan. And here is it intransitive or transitive? It is intransitive, because its verbal noun is "turning away" (suduud). But if it is transitive, meaning to turn away another, then its verbal noun is "turning away" (sada), yasaduhu yasaduhu saddan, like yardu yardu raddan. Is that clear? Good. Here they turn away when called. I saw the hypocrites turning away from you with a turning away.
Allah the Mighty and Majestic said: And is this calamity that Allah mentioned a worldly calamity or a religious calamity, or both? Both, because whenever it is possible for a verse to encompass both meanings and they do not contradict each other, that is preferable. If a calamity strikes them, it may be a worldly calamity by poverty, drought, and the like, so they come complaining to the Messenger, peace and blessings be upon him, complaining to him, and saying: O Messenger of Allah, we have been struck by these calamities and we did not intend anything but good and success. Or it may be a religious calamity, and what is meant by it is when Allah reveals His Messenger over their affair, they come swearing that they only intended good and success. And both matters are correct. So when Allah reveals to His Prophet about them, they come making excuses, saying: We only intended good and success.
And His saying: The letter "ba" here indicates causality. "Bima" (by what) is a relative pronoun, and its relative clause is fronted, with the resumptive pronoun omitted. The implied meaning is "by what their hands have brought forward," that is, by what they themselves have brought forward. However, in the Arabic language, such an expression is used to mean the same agent: "by what their hands have brought forward" means by the evil deeds and hypocrisy they have brought forward. They came to the Messenger (peace and blessings be upon him) swearing by Allah, that is, taking oaths by Him, that "we did not intend anything but good and guidance." "Good" in the sense that we would be saved from disgrace and shame, and "guidance" in the sense of reconciling the believers and the disbelievers, or between the path of disbelief and the path of faith. That is to say: We wish to reconcile your path, O you Muslims, with the path of the disbelievers; we would walk with you and walk with them. This is the state of the hypocrites. They say, "We did not intend anything but good, that we might improve our conduct and methodology, and live with these and those, reconciling the two parties." Is this possible or not? It is not possible. For this reason, Allah threatened them with His saying: Because He, (Exalted and Majestic is He), is the Knower of the unseen . In fact, the Lord, (Exalted and Majestic is He), knows better than you what is in your heart, or not? Is there anything more eloquent than this interposition? Is there anyone who can interpose between you and your heart? No one can interpose between you and your heart. It is the human being's heart that he manages. If it is sound, the whole body is sound, and if it is corrupt, the whole body is corrupt. But the Lord, (Mighty and Majestic), interposes between you and your heart. This is among the most eloquent things in knowledge and experience: that He, (Exalted and Majestic is He), interposes between a person and his heart. For this reason, you sometimes find a person determined to do something, then he does not realize until Allah the Exalted has turned him away from it. For this reason, "It was said to a Bedouin, 'By what did you know your Lord?' He said, 'By the nullification of resolutions and the turning away of ambitions.'" See how the Bedouin put it? By the nullification of resolutions and the turning away of ambitions. Is this correct or not? Always, a person resolves, perhaps taking steps toward what he wants, then he does not realize until the resolution is nullified, without any tangible cause. And the turning away of ambitions: a person is ambitious about something, and ambition comes before resolution, then he is turned away from it, without there being an apparent cause. This is like the saying of the other Bedouin: "By what did you know your Lord? - But that one cited a tangible matter. He was asked, 'By what did you know your Lord?' He said: 'The track indicates the journey, and the dung indicates the camel - meaning this Bedouin was a camel owner - and a sky with constellations and an earth with valleys, and seas with waves; do they not indicate the All-Hearing, All-Seeing?'" Glory be to Allah. Do they indicate it or not? They indicate it, by Allah, with the greatest indication.
So the result is that Allah says of these people, threatening them: What is in them of hypocrisy, plotting, and deception, may Allah protect us from it. And this is the ultimate degree of humiliation. Turn away from them, for Allah the Exalted will take charge of them, meaning He will mention them and make them fear, but do not make them the greatest of your concerns. Leave them as if they did not exist, and do what is obligatory upon you of admonition.