Tafsir of Surah An-Nisa' - Verse 28

وَيَهْدِيَكُمْ سُنَنَ الَّذِينَ مِن قَبْلِكُمْ

(And to show you the ways of those before you,) meaning their righteous ways and how to adhere to the commandments that He likes and is pleased with.

وَيَتُوبَ عَلَيْكُمْ

(and accept your repentance) from sin and error,

وَاللَّهُ عَلِيمٌ حَكِيمٌ

(and Allah is All-Knower, All-Wise.) in His commands, decrees, actions and statements. Allah's statement,

وَيُرِيدُ الَّذِينَ يَتَّبِعُونَ الشَّهَوَتِ أَن تَمِيلُواْ مَيْلاً عَظِيماً

(but those who follow their lusts, wish that you (believers) should deviate tremendously away from the right path)) indicates that the followers of Shaytan among the Jews, Christians and the adulterous, wish that you would take the horrendous path of falsehood instead of the truth.

يُرِيدُ اللَّهُ أَن يُخَفِّفَ عَنْكُمْ

(Allah wishes to lighten (the burden) for you") His legislation, orders, what He prohibits and what He decrees for you. This is why Allah has allowed free men to marry slave girls under certain conditions, as Mujahid and others have stated.

وَخُلِقَ الإِنسَـنُ ضَعِيفاً

(and man was created weak.) and this is why it is suitable in his case that the commands are made easy for him, because of his weakness and feebleness. Ibn Abi Hatim recorded that Tawus said that,

وَخُلِقَ الإِنسَـنُ ضَعِيفاً

(and man was created weak), "Concerning women". Waki` said, "Man's mind leaves when women are involved."

After this, in the first part of verse 28, it was said: يُرِ‌يدُ اللَّـهُ أَن يُخَفِّفَ عَنكُمْ : It means that Allah, great in His majesty, intends to make things easy on you, that is, prescribes injunctions which can be carried out by everyone obligated with them. If one cannot afford marrying free women, permission has been given to marry bond-women. Parties to a marriage were given the right to settle the dower by mutual consent. Also given was the right to marry more than one woman under circumstantial necessity, of course, on condition that justice is not compromised.

At the end, in the second part of verse 28, the text says: وَخُلِقَ الْإِنسَانُ ضَعِيفًا ،(And man has been created weak). It means that man is weak by nature, and constituted desire-prone. If man was asked to stay away from women, totally and absolutely, he would have been a hopeless performer when it came to obeying the injunctions of Allah. It was, in view of his weakness and limitations, that he was not only permitted to marry women, but also that he was induced to do so. It goes without saying that the post-marriage life of a couple offers great benefits of mutual self-realization and most of all they enjoy the blessings of a sight that is untainted and a character that is unalloyed. This mutual purity of the couple increases the moral quality of life for both of them, making them strong, self-reliant and happy. So, marriage is a smart mutual contract to remove any chances of weakness that may afflict men and. women - a peerless method indeed.

There is nothing new about the moral standards laid down in the Quran. In every age God has been proclaiming them through His messengers and believing people in every age have followed them. But since the ancient heavenly books could not remain untampered with, the divine modes of living were consequently lost or obscured. God, however, revealed them again in the Arabic language through His final Messenger. Today, when any group of people follows them, it joins that eternal caravan of righteous humanity which, favoured with the grace of God, adhered steadfastly to the divine path. In every group of people certain traditions become rooted as a matter of centuries-old practice and people become too accustomed to them to think of them critically. When an original thinker tries to bring in social reform, he is bitterly opposed by traditionalists. They find it difficult to leave their familiar ways and adopt unfamiliar ones. They become hostile to any effort at reformation which would distance them from the ways of their forefathers. In such cases the reaction of the religious class is by far the strongest. When the core of a religion becomes weak, it is vitiated by hair-splitting arguments, and a structure of elaborate rules based on form is built up. Devoid of the real spirit, people keep following the old rituals, thinking that they are adhering to the religion of God. This religion of human creation is gradually identified with their forefathers and becomes sacred. Ultimately, the simple and natural religion of God is so heavily veiled that it becomes difficult to recognize it as the original religion. The situation being such, any movement for the revival of the simple and natural religion faces bitter opposition; people find their ritualistic dogma threatened and negated by it. Those whose dogma is based on self-styled faith viciously oppose any effort to revive God’s simple and straightforward religion, because they anticipate that such an effort may lead to the end of their dominance and leadership.