Surah al-Ahzab (The Confederates) 33 : 56

Overview (Verses 56 - 62)

Further Instructions and a Warning
 
The sūrah continues to warn those who give offence to the Prophet, either in person or with regard to his family, showing their action as an enormity. It does so in two ways: honouring the Prophet and describing his status with his Lord and on high, and stating that to give offence to the Prophet is to give offence to God Himself. Therefore, it earns the perpetrator expulsion from God’s mercy both in the present life and in the life to come. Furthermore, the perpetrators stand to suffer a humiliating punishment:
 
God and His angels bless the Prophet. Believers! Bless him and give him greetings of peace. Those who affront God and His Messenger will be rejected by God in this world and in the life to come. He has prepared for them a humiliating suffering. (Verses 56-57)
 
The Arabic text uses the word şalāt and its derivatives for what is rendered in English as ‘bless’. Şalāt means prayer, but prayer by God for the Prophet means that
 
God praises him to those on high, while when it refers to the angels it means that they pray to God for him. This gives the Prophet a sublime position: the whole universe echoes God’s praise of His Prophet. No honour could be greater than this. How would a prayer and blessing by human beings compare with God’s own blessing and honour bestowed on the Prophet, or with those of the angels among the community on high? There is certainly no comparison, but God wishes to bestow honour on the believers by putting their blessing of the Prophet together with His own, thus providing them with a tie with those on high.
 
When God so honours and praises the Prophet, it is exceedingly grotesque for humans to give offence to him: “Those who affront God and His Messenger will be rejected by God in this world and in the life to come. He has prepared for them a humiliating suffering.” (Verse 57) What makes this even more grotesque and ridiculous is that it is an affront to God by His creatures. They can never affront or offend God, but the expression here serves to show great sensitivity to any offence committed against the Prophet, in effect making it an offence against God Himself.
 
The sūrah then speaks of giving offence to believers generally, men and women, and falsely attributing to them what they do not have: “And those who malign believing men and women for no wrong they might have done shall have burdened themselves with the guilt of calumny and with a blatant injustice.” (Verse 58) This strong condemnation suggests that there was in Madinah at the time a group of people who schemed in this way against believers: they defamed them, conspired against them and circulated false allegations about them. This takes place in all communities at all times with believers in particular being so maligned. God therefore undertakes to reply o their accusers, describing them as hypocrites guilty of calumny and injustice. He certainly says only what is absolutely true.
 
God Almighty then instructs His Messenger to issue an order to his wives, daughters and Muslim women generally requiring them, when they leave their homes, to cover their bodies and heads with an outer garment. In this way, they would be recognized and he protected from the machinations of transgressors. Their modest appearance would distinguish them as chaste women, which embarrasses those who follow women o tease and malign them:
 
Prophet! Say to your wives, daughters and all believing women that they should draw over themselves some of their outer garments. This will be more conducive to their being recognized and not affronted. God is Much-Forgiving, Merciful. (Verse 59)
 
Commenting on this verse, al-Suddī says: “Some wicked people in Madinah used to go out at nightfall to make indecent remarks to women. Houses in Madinah were small. Therefore, women went out at night to relieve themselves. However, they were maligned by such wicked remarks. When such people saw a woman wrapped in her outer cover, they refrained from maligning her as they recognized her as free and chaste. A woman who did not have such a cover was subjected to their affronts as they thought her to be a slave.”
 
Mujāhid says: “When they put on their outer cover, they were recognized as free and chaste women. No one maligned them. As for the verse ending, ‘God is Much- Forgiving, Merciful,’ it means that He forgave women what happened in the past, as they were not aware of what they should do.
 
We note the great care taken to purge all wicked behaviour from the Muslim society. These elements had to be pushed into a narrow corner, while new Islamic values and traditions took firm root in the Muslim community.
 
The passage concludes with a stern warning to the hypocrites and those who were sick at heart as well as those who circulated false rumours requiring that they stop all such wicked action, and refrain from affronting the believers and the Muslim community as a whole. Unless they stopped, God would empower His Messenger to drive them out of Madinah, so that they could be taken and killed wherever they were. This was the law applied, by God’s leave, in past generations, and it could easily be revived:
 
If the hypocrites, those who are sick at heart and those who spread lies in the city do not desist, We will rouse you against them, and then they will not be your neighbours in this city except for a little while: bereft of God’s grace, they shall be seized wherever they may be found, and will be slain. Such has been God’s way with those who went before. Never will you find any change in God’s way. (Verses 60-62)
 
This powerful warning gives us a clear impression of the Muslims’ strong position in Madinah after the Qurayżah affair. Indeed, the Muslim state was now in full power. The hypocrites could only scheme in secret, unable to demonstrate their reality. Indeed, they remained always in fear.