Tafsir of Surah Al-Isra - Verse 56

The gods of the Idolators can neither benefit nor harm; rather they themselves seek to draw close to Allah

Allah says:

قُلْ

(Say) O Muhammad to these idolators who worship things other than Allah,

ادْعُواْ الَّذِينَ زَعَمْتُم مِّن دُونِهِ

(Call upon those - besides Him whom you pretend.) such as idols and rivals of Allah. Even if you turn to them,

فَلاَ يَمْلِكُونَ كَشْفَ الضُّرِّ عَنْكُمْ

(They have neither the power to remove the adversity from you) they have no such power at all,

وَلاَ تَحْوِيلاً

(nor even to shift (it from you to another person.)) to lift the distress from you and give it to someone else. The meaning is that the only one Who is able to do that is Allah Alone, with no partner or associate, Who is the One Who creates and issues commands.

قُلِ ادْعُواْ الَّذِينَ زَعَمْتُم

(Say: "Call upon those whom you pretend) Al-`Awfi reported from Ibn `Abbas, "The people of Shirk used to say, `we worship the angels and the Messiah and `Uzayr,' while these (the angels and the Messiah and `Uzayr) themselves call upon Allah."

أُولَـئِكَ الَّذِينَ يَدْعُونَ

(Those whom they call upon, desire) Al-Bukhari recorded from Sulayman bin Mahran Al-A`mash, from Ibrahim, from Abu Ma`mar, from `Abdullah:

أُولَـئِكَ الَّذِينَ يَدْعُونَ يَبْتَغُونَ إِلَى رَبِّهِمُ الْوَسِيلَةَ

(Those whom they call upon, desire a means of access to their Lord,) "Some of the Jinn used to be worshipped, then they became Muslims." According to another report: "Some humans used to worship some of the Jinn, then those Jinn became Muslim, but those humans adhered to their religion (of worshipping the Jinn)."

وَيَرْجُونَ رَحْمَتَهُ وَيَخَـفُونَ عَذَابَهُ

(they hope for His mercy and fear His torment.) Worship cannot be complete or perfect unless it is accompanied by both fear and hope. Fear stops one from doing things that are forbidden, and hope makes one do more good deeds.

إِنَّ عَذَابَ رَبِّكَ كَانَ مَحْذُورًا

(Verily, the torment of your Lord is (something) to be afraid of!) meaning, one should beware of it and be afraid lest it happen. We seek refuge with Allah from that.

That Zabur (the Psalms) has been mentioned particularly in the last sentence of verse 55: وَآتَيْنَا دَاوُودَ زَبُورً‌ا ، (And We gave Dawud the Zabur) has been done, perhaps, because Zabur reports that the Holy Prophet ﷺ will be a ruler along with being a messenger and prophet. This is as it appears in the Qur'an: وَلَقَدْ كَتَبْنَا فِي الزَّبُورِ‌ مِن بَعْدِ الذِّكْرِ‌ أَنَّ الْأَرْ‌ضَ يَرِ‌ثُهَا عِبَادِيَ الصَّالِحُونَ (And We have already written in the Zabur, after the [ previous ] mention, that the land is inherited by My righteous servants - al-Anbiya', 21:105).

At this stage, Imam al-Baghawi says in his Tafsir that Zabur is a book of Allah revealed to Sayyidna Dawud (علیہ السلام) . It has one hundred and fifty surahs or chapters and all surahs are restricted to praises of Allah and prayers to Him. The areas of lawful and unlawful, obligations and limits have not been taken up there.

The entities given the status of objects of worship by man are themselves creations of God, for instance, pious people or the angels. They have not claimed divine status for themselves. It is their followers who worship and glorify them. If one had the insight to perceive the unseen, one would see a strange sight. One would see that man gives the status of an object of worship to certain personalities at that very time when those very personalities shudder at the thought of God’s Majesty: they themselves are forced to seek His mercy to attain salvation.