Makkan, by agreement
The middle years in Makkah
It is Makkan in the saying of all. One ayah is differed over, the sixth — “those given knowledge see that what has been sent down to you from your Lord is the truth”: some said it is Makkan and means the believing Companions, as Ibn ʿAbbās held; others that it is Madinan and means those of the People of the Book who believed. The traditional order places the surah fifty-eighth.
سُورَةُ سَبَإٍ وَهِيَ مَكِّيَّةٌ بِإجْماعِهِمْ وَقالَ الضَّحّاكُ، وابْنُ السّائِبِ، ومُقاتِلٌ: فِيها آيَةٌ مَدَنِيَّةٌسُورَةُ سَبَأٍ مَكِّيَّةٌ فِي قَوْلِ الْجَمِيعِ، إِلَّا آيَةً وَاحِدَةً اخْتُلِفَ فِيهَاThe same, in other works
- al-BaghawīMaʿālim al-tanzīlAhl al-Sunnah in creedShāfiʿī in fiqh→
Makkan.
سُورَةُ سَبَأٍ مَكِّيَّةٌ
- al-Suyūṭīal-Durr al-manthūrAshʿarī in creedShāfiʿī in fiqh→
Ibn ʿAbbās: it came down in Makkah. Recorded by Ibn al-Ḍurays, al-Naḥḥās, Ibn Mardawayh and al-Bayhaqī.
أخْرَجَ ابْنُ الضُّرَيْسِ والنُّحاسُ، وابْنُ مَرْدُويَهْ والبَيْهَقِيُّ في الدَّلائِلِ عَنِ ابْنِ عَبّاسٍ قالَ: نَزَلَتْ سُورَةُ سَبَأٍ بِمَكَّةَ
A report he gathers; its chain is not graded here.
- al-ShawkānīFatḥ al-qadīr→
Makkan.
تَفْسِيرُ سُورَةِ سَبَأٍ وهِيَ مَكِّيَّةٌ
- al-RāzīMafātīḥ al-ghaybAshʿarī in creedShāfiʿī in fiqh→
Makkan; Madinan is also said.
مَكِّيَّةٌ، وقِيلَ: فِيها آيَةٌ مَدَنِيَّةٌ وهي ﴿ويَرى الَّذِينَ أُوتُوا العِلْمَ الَّذِي أُنْزِلَ إلَيْكَ﴾ الآيَةَ
- Abū al-SuʿūdIrshād al-ʿaql al-salīmMāturīdī in creedḤanafī in fiqh→
Makkan; some except what he names.
سُورَةُ سَبَأٍ مَكِّيَّةٌ، وقِيلَ: إلّا ﴿وَيَرى الَّذِينَ أُوتُوا العِلْمَ﴾ ... الآيَةَ. وهى أرْبَعٌ وخَمْسُونَ آيَةً
Each line of English says what the Arabic beneath it says.
What was happening
The men who led Makkah were rich, and they read their riches as a verdict. The surah quotes them: “We have more wealth and children, and we are not going to be punished.” It answers them directly — “It is not your wealth nor your children that bring you near to Us” — but it answers them first with two histories, set side by side.
Dāwūd and Sulaymān were given more than any man of Quraysh could imagine. For the father, the mountains and the birds were made to echo his praises, and iron was made soft so that he could fashion coats of mail. For the son, the wind ran at his command, a spring of molten copper flowed, and the jinn worked before him, building whatever he wished. The command that came with it all was: “Work, O family of Dāwūd, in gratitude. And few of My servants are grateful.” Then the surah shows how thin even that power was. Sulaymān died leaning on his staff, and the jinn went on toiling, unaware, until a creature of the earth gnawed the staff through and he fell.
Sabaʾ is the other case. Their land was a sign in itself: two gardens, to the right and to the left — “Eat of the provision of your Lord, and give thanks to Him: a good land, and a forgiving Lord.” They turned away. The flood of the dam was loosed upon them, and their gardens were exchanged for bitter fruit and tamarisk; the easy stages of their trade road were lost, and they were scattered until they became a byword. The Arabs of the Ḥijāz knew this history. Some of their own tribes traced themselves to that dispersal.
The rest of the surah presses the point home in argument. Those you call upon besides Allah do not own an atom’s weight in the heavens or the earth. On the Day, the weak and the proud will each blame the other. And the Prophet ﷺ is told to ask of his people one thing only: “that you stand up for Allah, in pairs and singly, and then reflect: there is no madness in your companion.”
بيان مظاهر القدرة الإلهية على تبديل الأحوال، وأحوال الخلق في النعم بين الشكر والكفر.
To show the divine power to change conditions, and the states of people under blessing — between thankfulness and ingratitude.
The surah’s aim, as al-Mukhtaṣar fī al-Tafsīr states it
- Gratitude and ingratitude
- Dāwūd and Sulaymān
- The people of Sabaʾ and the flood
- The helplessness of false gods
- Wealth is no proof of favour
- The Messenger ﷺ sent to all mankind
Its aims, as Ibn ʿĀshūr sets them out
من أغراض هذه السورة إبطال قواعد الشرك وأعظمها إشراكهم آلهة مع الله وإنكار البعث فابتدئ بدليل على انفراده تعالى بالإلهية ونفي الإلهية عن أصنامهم ونفي أن تكون الأصنام شفعاء لعبادها.
ثم موضوع البعث.
وإثبات إحاطة علم الله بما في السماوات وما في الأرض فما يخبر به فهو واقع ومن ذلك إثبات البعث والجزاء.
وإثبات صدق النبيء فيما أخبر به، وصدق ما جاء به القرآن وأن القرآن شهد به علماء أهل الكتاب.
From its first ayah to its last
- 1–99 ayat · 19% of the surahRead from ayah 1 →
Praise, and the denial of the Hour
Praise be to Allah, to whom belongs all that is in the heavens and the earth; His is the praise in the Hereafter. Those who disbelieve say, “The Hour will not come to us.” Say: yes, by my Lord, it will come — the Knower of the unseen, from whom not an atom’s weight escapes. They say, “Shall we show you a man who tells you that when you have been utterly torn apart, you will be in a new creation?”
- 10–145 ayat · 11% of the surahRead from ayah 10 →
The family of Dāwūd
We gave Dāwūd bounty from Us: “Mountains, echo with him, and you birds.” We made iron soft for him: make full coats of mail. To Sulaymān the wind — its morning course a month, and its evening course a month — and a spring of molten copper, and jinn who worked before him. “Work, family of Dāwūd, in thanks.” When We decreed death for him, nothing showed them his death but a creature of the earth eating at his staff.
- 15–217 ayat · 13% of the surahRead from ayah 15 →
Sabaʾ
For Sabaʾ there was a sign in their dwelling-place: two gardens, right and left. “A good land, and a forgiving Lord.” But they turned away, so We sent on them the flood of the dam, and gave them in place of their gardens two bearing bitter fruit. They said, “Our Lord, lengthen the distance between our journeys,” and wronged themselves; We made them tales, and scattered them utterly. Iblīs found his surmise about them true.
- 22–309 ayat · 14% of the surahRead from ayah 22 →
Not an atom’s weight
Say: call on those you claim besides Allah. They do not own an atom’s weight in the heavens or the earth. Intercession avails with Him only for the one He permits — until, when terror is lifted from their hearts, they say, “What did your Lord say?” — “The truth.” Say: we or you are either upon guidance or in plain error. We have not sent you but to all mankind, as a bringer of good news and a warner.
- 31–4212 ayat · 24% of the surahRead from ayah 31 →
The followers and the leaders
If you could see the wrongdoers stood before their Lord, throwing the blame back and forth. The weak will say to the proud, “Had it not been for you, we would have been believers.” No warner was sent to a town but its affluent said: “We have more wealth and children, and we shall not be punished.” It is not your wealth nor your children that bring you near to Us. Whatever you spend, He will replace it.
- 43–5412 ayat · 20% of the surahRead from ayah 43 →
One thing
When Our clear ayat are recited to them they say, “This is only a man who wants to turn you from what your fathers worshipped.” Say: I exhort you to one thing only — that you stand for Allah, in twos and singly, and then reflect (34:46). Say: I ask of you no wage. Say: the truth has come, and falsehood neither begins anything nor brings it back. If you could see when they are terrified, with no escape, and seized from a place near at hand.
The division into passages is a reading aid, written for this page; it is not part of the muṣḥaf. Each passage is drawn as long as its words are.
The sound each ayah closes on
Read aloud, every ayah closes on a sound — its fāṣilah — and the closes answer one another for a stretch, then turn. Each sound this surah closes on is a line of the staff below, and the surah is the gold line stepping along them, an ayah at a time: where it steps to another line, the rhyme turns. The dotted lines are where its passages begin.
Its commonest close carries 48% of its ayat, and the rhyme turns 22 times. 3 of those turns come just where a new passage begins, as this page divides the surah.
Move along the staff to see what each ayah closes on.
Computed from the text, each ayah as it is said when the reciter stops on it: the last vowel falls away, tanwīn on alif is said as a long ā, and tāʾ marbūṭah as h. Closes the ear hears as one rhyme share a line — -ūn, -īn and -īm; -ān and -ām — and an ayah that is only the opening letters closes on the name of its last letter.
From the Prophet ﷺ and his Companions
“When Allah decrees a matter in heaven, the angels beat their wings in submission to His word, with a sound like a chain upon smooth rock. When terror is lifted from their hearts they say: ‘What did your Lord say?’ They say: ‘The truth; and He is the Most High, the Great.’”The name it is known by
After the people of its fifteenth ayah: the kingdom of southern Arabia whose prosperity rested on the great dam of Maʾrib. It is one of five surahs that open with “Praise be to Allah”.
Its place in the muṣḥaf
Ayat you will hear named
Where this comes from
The figures at the head of the page are counted from the text. The Arabic quotations are taken letter for letter from the copies of the classical works held on this site, and each links to the passage it stands in. The rest was written for Mishkāt from the works below. It is an introduction, not a tafsir: where it matters, read the scholars themselves.
Works quoted on this page
- تفسير البغويMaʿālim al-tanzīlal-Ḥusayn al-Baghawī (d. 516 AH)
- تفسير ابن الجوزيZād al-masīrAbū al-Faraj ibn al-Jawzī (d. 597 AH)
- تفسير القرطبيal-Jāmiʿ li-aḥkām al-QurʾānShams al-Dīn al-Qurṭubī (d. 671 AH)
- تفسير ابن كثيرTafsīr al-Qurʾān al-ʿaẓīmIsmāʿīl ibn Kathīr (d. 774 AH)
- الدر المنثورal-Durr al-manthūrJalāl al-Dīn al-Suyūṭī (d. 911 AH)
- فتح القدير للشوكانيFatḥ al-qadīrMuḥammad al-Shawkānī (d. 1250 AH)
- تفسير الرازيMafātīḥ al-ghaybFakhr al-Dīn al-Rāzī (d. 606 AH)
- تفسير أبي السعودIrshād al-ʿaql al-salīmAbū al-Suʿūd al-ʿImādī (d. 982 AH)
- التحرير والتنويرal-Taḥrīr wa-l-tanwīrMuḥammad al-Ṭāhir ibn ʿĀshūr (d. 1393 AH)
- المختصر في التفسيرal-Mukhtaṣar fī al-tafsīrMarkaz Tafsīr, a committee of scholars
Beside each scholar quoted stand his creed and his school of fiqh, so that he can be read with discernment. The site’s library holds other commentaries as well; the introductions do not draw on them.
al-Qurṭubī is quoted on these pages only for what he transmits: who said a surah is Makkan or Madinan, and what it has been called. On the attributes of Allah his commentary interprets, in places, in the way of the Ashʿarīs rather than the way of the Salaf, and nothing of that is taken from him here.
al-Rāzī and Abū al-Suʿūd are quoted on these pages only for where a surah came down, and Ibn ʿĀshūr only for the aims of the surah. Nothing on the attributes of Allah is taken from them, and no report comes by way of them. Ibn ʿĀshūr’s statement of the aims is not in the site’s copy of his book: it is read from the Shamela typing as OpenITI holds it, with reports and al-Zamakhsharī’s words left out, and it links to its page there.
Every hadith here says where it is recorded and how it is graded. What is in al-Bukhārī or Muslim is marked ṣaḥīḥ. Outside the two, the grading followed is al-Albānī’s; where none of his was found, the scholar who graded it is named. A report known to be weak or fabricated is not given here at all. A report that is ḥasan, or a Companion’s own saying, or related by the commentators without a graded chain, says so beside it. In the account of what was happening, a small sign after a sentence says the same of the report that sentence tells, and a question mark stands where a date or a figure is not certain, or beside a grading — underlined — that has something to say about its own source: rest on it, or touch it, and it gives the reason. What is drawn from the sīrah — the campaigns, the dates, who was present — is history as its scholars transmit it, and is not graded here.
Also drawn on
- Ṣaḥīḥ al-Bukhārī
The order of revelation is the one printed at the head of each surah in the Egyptian muṣḥaf, which rests on lists transmitted from Ibn ʿAbbās and Jābir ibn Zayd. It places a surah by where it began. Many surahs came down in parts, over years, and the scholars treat the list as a guide, not a certainty.