فَإِن تَوَلَّوْا۟ فَقَدْ أَبْلَغْتُكُم مَّآ أُرْسِلْتُ بِهِۦٓ إِلَيْكُمْ ۚ وَيَسْتَخْلِفُ رَبِّى قَوْمًا غَيْرَكُمْ وَلَا تَضُرُّونَهُۥ شَيْـًٔا ۚ إِنَّ رَبِّى عَلَىٰ كُلِّ شَىْءٍ حَفِيظٌ
7:69; 46:24.
4:134; 6:134.
Important Words:
حفیظ (Guardian) is derived from حفظ. They say حفظه i.e. he kept it, preserved it, guarded it or protected it; he prevented it from perishing or becoming lost. حفظ السر means, he kept the secret. حفظ یـمینه means, he kept or fulfilled his oath. حفظ القرآنmeans, he committed the Quran to memory or he retained the Quran in his memory. حافظ or حفیظ means, a keeper, preserver, watcher or guardian of a thing; one who is careful, mindful, attentive or considerate. الحفیظ is one of the attributive names of God and means the Preserver of all things; He from Whose preservation nothing is excluded (Lane & Aqrab).
Commentary:
The opponents of God’s Prophets, in their ignorance, often think that by rejecting the Message of a Prophet, they can do him any harm. But in no way can they harm a Divine Messenger. In fact, the rejection of a message can either harm the person who sends the message or the person to whom the message is sent. It cannot harm the bearer of the message. So the Prophet Hud says that he is only a Message-bearer, and therefore he would come to harm only if he failed to deliver his Message, but as he has faithfully delivered the Message he need fear no harm. Again, the rejection of the Message by the people can do no harm to God, Who is the Sender of the Message, for He is All-Powerful. So the only people who can come to grief by the rejection of the Message are those who reject it. If the people to whom it is originally addressed do not accept it, some other people will accept it and it will make them prosper. The Divine Message can never go in vain.
By the words, my Lord is Guardian over all things, Prophet Hud means to say that God will guard the teachings which He has sent through him. They also mean that the works of disbelievers are in the custody of God and they will have to render an account of them before Him.