SURA VII.-AL ARAF [LXXXVII.]
Project Gutenberg EPUB3 edition
Rodwell, J. M. (John Medows)
And if stirrings to evil from Satan stir thee, fly thou for refuge to God: He verily heareth, knoweth!
Verily, they who fear God, when some phantom from Satan toucheth them, remember Him, and lo! they see clearly.
Their Brethren52 will only continue them in error, and cannot preserve themselves from it.
And when thou bringest not a verse (sign) of the Koran to them, they say, "Hast thou not yet patched it up?53 SAY: I only follow my Lord's utterances to me. This is a clear proof on the part of your Lord, and a guidance and a mercy for those who believe.
And when the Koran is read, then listen ye to it and keep silence, that haply ye may obtain mercy.
And think within thine own self on God, with lowliness and with fear and without loud spoken words, at even and at morn; and be not one of the heedless.
Verily they who are round about thy Lord disdain not His service. They praise Him and prostrate themselves before Him.
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1 The initial letters, it has been conjectured, of (Amara li Muhammad sahdiq), thus spake to me Muhammad the truthful. But see Sura 1xviii. p. 32. The first part of this Sura was perhaps revealed when the Arabians were assembled at the Pilgrimage. See verse 29.
2 A figure of frequent occurence in the Talmud. See Tr. Rosh. Haschana, 17a.
3 Comp. Sura xx. 118, p. 101.
4 Gen. iii. 15.
5 Lit. towards each Mosque, i.e. towards the kibla of each Mosque. The word mosque, mesjid, however, is usually applied only to that of Mecca. The common term in use for larger places of worship is djami, a word unknown, in that sense, to the Koran.
6 For full information as to the clothing of the ancient Arabians see Freyt. Einl. pp. 295 327. The Koreisch (we are told in Sirat Arrasul, fol. 26, and Beidh.), in order to instil a deep respect for the Caaba and other holy places into the minds of the Arabians, had forbidden all food during the processions, and required that no clothes, except those borrowed from Meccans, should be worn, or that those who wore their own should devote them to God as holy vestments. The consequence was that most of the pilgrims visited the holy places in perfect nudity. Hence the precept in the text.
7 The Angels of Death.
8 Comp. Matth. xix. 24; Mark x. 25; Luke xviii. 25. By the change of a single vowel in the Arabic word for camel, we obtain the rendering, cable. In the Rabbinic form of the proverb, however, the elephant is substituted for the camel, which confirms the usual rendering and reading.
9 "On this wall (the name of which is derived from Arafa, 'to know,' with allusion to the employment of those upon it) will stand those whose good and evil works are equal, and are not, therefore, deserving of either Paradise or Gehenna. The idea, which is analogous to that of Purgatory, may be derived from the Talmud. Thus in the Midrasch on Eccl. vii. 14, 'How much space is there between the two' (Paradise and Hell)? R. Jochanan saith, a wall; R. Acha, a span: others hold them to be so close that a person may see from one into the other." See Plato's Phaed. 62.
10 That is, they will know the inmates of Paradise by their whiteness, and the people of Hell by the blackness of their faces.
11 That is, ye believers: to whom the speakers on Al Araf are supposed to turn.
12 The fruits of Paradise. Comp. Luke xvi. 19.
13 The fulfilment of its promises and threats.
14 The rain. Thus, the Rabbins call the rain "the might and power of God," Comp. Tract Tanith, fol. I, and connect it with the Resurrection, Tract Berachoth, fol. 33.
15 The Rabbins in like manner describe the mission of Noah. Comp. Sanhedr. 108. Midr. Rabbah on Gen. par. 30, 33; and on Eccl. 9, 14. See Sura [lxxv.] xi. 40.
16 The two tribes of Ad and Themoud-the latter of whom is mentioned by Diod. Sic. and Ptolemy-lay to the north of Mecca in the direct line of traffic between the countries to the north and to the south, and both probably disappeared with its cessation, when the Arabs were no longer held in check by the Romans. The traditions adopted by Muhammad attribute this to the divine vengeance, throughout the Koran, and were derived by him from the popular legends of Arabia. See Freyt. Einl. p. 12.
17 On Houd, see Geiger, pp. 113 119. He supposes him to be the Eber of the Bible. But Mr. Muir suggests that both Houd and Saleh may have been persecuted Jewish or Christian emissaries and teachers, whose rejection was thus recast by Muhammad. See note on verse 71.
18 Or, entrusted, i.e. with the office of apostle.
19 Saleh-according to Bochart, the Peleg of Gen. xi. 16. D'Herbelot, B. O. 740, makes him the Schelah of Gen. xi. 13. See v. 63, n. and p. 220, n.
20 It is just possible that the act of Koleib, chief of the Banu Taghlib tribe, in killing the milch camel of Basûs, a female relative of his wife of Bani-Bakr lineage-which led to a forty years' war between these two tribes, A.D. 490-may have been worked up by Muhammad into this account of the persecutions of Saleh.
21 See Sura xxiv. 176, p. 109.
22 This verse may contain an implied reference to the famine with which Mecca had been visited, and fix the date of this part of the Sura. Comp. verse 127.
23 Lit. plot, stratagem.
24 Comp. the passage from Pirke R. Eliezer, c. 48, who makes Moses perform this miracle in the presence of Pharaoh, which the Scripture (Ex. vii.) account does not. The Muhammadan tradition is that Moses was a black.
25 Lit. cause him to hope, temporise with him.
26 Lit. male ominati sunt. Mar. They traced their calamities to Moses. So Sale. Kas. But Ullmann. renders, they attributed their misfortunes to the predictions of Moses.
27 In Suras [lxvii.] xvii. and [lxviii.] Muhammad speaks of nine plagues. The flood is not mentioned in the Scripture.
28 Lit. when we removed from them the plague until a period at which they should arrive.
29 Lit. that in which these are.
30 Lit. the set time of his Lord was fulfilled in forty nights.
31 Sale and others render having a body, corporeal, of which the commentators give no satisfactory explanation. I have adopted that given by Freytag in v. That the calf lowed in consequence of Sama‰l having entered into it, is one of the traditions of the Talmud. Pirke R. Eliezer, c. 45.
32 Compare Sura [lxxxi.] xxix. 47, [xciv.] lxxii. 2, [xci.] ii. 73. The word ummyy is derived from ummah, a nation, and means Gentile; it here refers to Muhammad's ignorance, previous to the revelation of Islam, of the ancient Scriptures. It is equivalent to the Gr. laic, ethnic, and to the term gojim, as applied by the Jews to those unacquainted with the Scriptures. There can, however, be no doubt that Muhammad-in spite of his assertions to the contrary, with the view of proving his inspiration-was well acquainted with the Bible histories. He wished to appear ignorant in order to raise the elegance of the Koran into a miracle. For the passages of Scripture said to foretel Muhammad, see Pocock's Sp. Hist. Ar. p. 188, ed. White.