Tafsir of Surah Al-Ahzab - Verse 67

No One knows when the Day of Resurrection will come except Allah

Here Allah tells His Messenger that he cannot know when the Hour will come, and if people ask him about that, He instructs him to refer the matter to Allah, may He be exalted, as Allah says in Surat Al-A`raf, even though that was revealed in Makkah and this Surah was revealed in Al-Madinah. Allah continues to tell him to refer this matter to the One Who knows about it, but He tells him that it is at hand, as He says:

وَمَا يُدْرِيكَ لَعَلَّ السَّاعَةَ تَكُونُ قَرِيباً

(What do you know It may be that the Hour is near!) This is like the Ayat:

اقْتَرَبَتِ السَّاعَةُ وَانشَقَّ الْقَمَرُ

(The Hour has drawn near, and the moon has been cleft asunder.) 54:1

اقْتَرَبَ لِلنَّاسِ حِسَـبُهُمْ وَهُمْ فِى غَفْلَةٍ مُّعْرِضُونَ

(Draws near for mankind their reckoning, while they turn away in heedlessness.) 21:1

أَتَى أَمْرُ اللَّهِ فَلاَ تَسْتَعْجِلُوهُ

(The Event (the Hour) ordained by Allah will come to pass, so seek not to hasten it) 16:1.

The Curse on the Disbelievers and its Eternity and their Regret

Then Allah says:

إِنَّ اللَّهَ لَعَنَ الْكَـفِرِينَ

(Verily, Allah has cursed the disbelievers,) means, He has distanced them from His mercy.

وَأَعَدَّ لَهُمْ سَعِيراً

(and has prepared for them a flaming Fire (Hell).) means, in the Hereafter. e

خَـلِدِينَ فِيهَآ أَبَداً

(Wherein they will abide forever,) means, they will stay there forever and ever, never leaving or finding relief from it.

لاَّ يَجِدُونَ وَلِيّاً وَلاَ نَصِيراً

(and they will find neither a a protector nor a helper.) means, they will have no saviour to help them or rescue them from their predicament. Then Allah says:

يَوْمَ تُقَلَّبُ وُجُوهُهُمْ فِى النَّارِ يَقُولُونَ يلَيْتَنَآ أَطَعْنَا اللَّهَ وَأَطَعْنَا الرَّسُولاَ

(On the Day when their faces will be turned over in the Fire, they will say: "Oh, would that we had obeyed Allah and obeyed the Messenger.") means, they will be dragged into the Fire on their faces and their faces will be contorted in Hell, and in that state they will wish that they had been among those who had obeyed Allah and His Messenger in this world. Allah describes how they will be in the Hereafter:

وَيَوْمَ يَعَضُّ الظَّـلِمُ عَلَى يَدَيْهِ يَقُولُ يلَيْتَنِى اتَّخَذْتُ مَعَ الرَّسُولِ سَبِيلاً - يوَيْلَتَا لَيْتَنِى لَمْ أَتَّخِذْ فُلاَناً خَلِيلاً

لَّقَدْ أَضَلَّنِى عَنِ الذِّكْرِ بَعْدَ إِذْ جَآءَنِى وَكَانَ الشَّيْطَـنُ لِلإِنْسَـنِ خَذُولاً

(And the Day when the wrongdoer will bite at his hands, he will say: "Oh! Would that I had taken a path with the Messenger. Ah! Woe to me! Would that I had never taken so-and-so as an intimate friend! He indeed led me astray from the Reminder after it had come to me. And Shaytan is to man ever a deserter in the hour of need.") (25:27-29)

رُّبَمَا يَوَدُّ الَّذِينَ كَفَرُواْ لَوْ كَانُواْ مُسْلِمِينَ

(How much would those who disbelieved wish that they had been Muslims.) (15:2) And here too, Allah tells us that when they are in this state, they will wish that they had obeyed Allah and His Messenger in this world:

وَقَالُواْ رَبَّنَآ إِنَّآ أَطَعْنَا سَادَتَنَا وَكُبَرَآءَنَا فَأَضَلُّونَا السَّبِيلاْ

(And they will say: "Our Lord! Verily, we obeyed our chiefs and our great ones, and they misled us from the way.") Tawus said: " `Our chiefs' means their nobles and `our great ones' means their scholars."

رَبَّنَآ ءَاتِهِمْ ضِعْفَيْنِ مِنَ الْعَذَابِ

(Our Lord! Give them double torment) means, `for their disbelief and because they mislead us.' Abu Al-Qasim At-Tabarani recorded from Abu Rafi` that among the names of those who fought with `Ali, may Allah be pleased with him, was Al-Hajjaj bin `Amr bin Ghaziyah, and he was the one who, when they met, said; "O people of the Ansar! Do you want to say when we meet our Lord:

وَقَالُواْ رَبَّنَآ إِنَّآ أَطَعْنَا سَادَتَنَا وَكُبَرَآءَنَا فَأَضَلُّونَا السَّبِيلاْ - رَبَّنَآ ءَاتِهِمْ ضِعْفَيْنِ مِنَ الْعَذَابِ وَالْعَنْهُمْ لَعْناً كَبِيراً

(Our Lord! Verily, we obeyed our chiefs and our great ones, and they misled us from the way. Our Lord! Give them double torment and curse them with a mighty curse!)"

Commentary

Those hostile to Allah and the Messenger were warned of and alerted to curse and punishment in the present world and in the Hereafter while many factions among the disbelievers, in their own place, simply denied the eventuality of any Qiyamah (Doomsday) or 'Akhirah (Hereafter) and, because of their denial, used to mockingly ask: When would that Qiyamah come? An answer to their question has been given in the cited verse, that the Doomsday may be in near future. It has been said so because nobody knows the exact date of the Doomsday, and therefore everyone should be prepared for it as if it were very close. Another reason for its being declared as close is that after facing the horrible incidents of Qiyamah the entire worldly life of thousands of years will seem to be very short (and the Qiyamah very close to it).

Enquiring about the exact day when the Day of Judgement would arrive did not mean that the enquiries had no belief whatsoever in Judgement Day. This was not meant to mock the Day of Judgement, but to ridicule the person who gave news of that Day. They did not deny that Judgement Day would actually come, but they did not believe in the nature of that Day, of which the Prophet and his companions gave specific details. Their real fault was that they gave undue importance to the leaders of their community, rather than showing due respect to the Prophet. That is why the words of the prominent persons of their community appeared to them more worthy of consideration than the words of the Prophet. But, on the Day of Judgement when the reality is revealed, they will regret that they could not differentiate between real greatness and false greatness, and that; having been deceived by false greatness, they went astray.