Overview (Verses 69 - 72)

The humiliation is even worse in the case of those who are proud and arrogant in this life. Hence, this image is followed with one in which we see the most hardened of these evil-doers being pulled and dragged towards it: “Thereupon We shall drag out from every group those who had been most obstinate in their rebellion against the Most Merciful.” (Verse 69) The sound here is stressed heavily, so that it gives an even more graphic and lifelike picture of how they are dragged out. Although the next image is left to our imagination, we nonetheless see them being thrown into hell.
 
God certainly knows best which people are more deserving of punishment in hell. No one is taken at random, or by chance from that huge multitude. It is God who has brought them here and He knows them all, one by one. He knows what each and every one of them deserves: “For, indeed, We know best who most deserve to be burnt in the fire of hell.” (Verse 70) Those, then, are the ones who will be chosen first for the fire.
 
The believers witness this fearful scene as they too are brought near to it: “There is not one among you who shall not pass over it: this is, for your Lord, a decree that must be fulfilled.” (Verse 71) They arrive there, look at hell as it burns fiercely, asking for more feed. They also see the tyrants and the hardened sinners as they are made to enter into it. The believers, however, have a different end: “But We shall save those who are God-fearing, and leave the wrongdoers there, on their knees.” (Verse 72)