لِّلْقَوْمِ ٱلظَّٰلِمِينَ

Commentary:

The expression, Our Lord, make us not a trial for the wrongdoing people, means either "may we not give, by our conduct, the wrongdoing people an opportunity to attack the true Faith"; or "make us not a target of the tyrannies of the wrongdoing people."

Important Words:

اقلعی (cease raining) is derived from قلع i.e. he displaced or uprooted. اقلع means, it (rain) left off; it cleared away. یاسماء اقلعیmeans, O sky, cease raining. اقلع عنه means, he or it left him; he abstained or desisted from it. They say أقلعت الحمی عن فلان i.e. the fever passed away or left such a one (Lane & Aqrab).

بعدا (curse) is the noun-infinitive from بعد which means, he or it was or became distant, remote, or aloof; he went or withdrew himself to a distance; he alienated; it perished. They say لا تعبد و ان بعدت عنی i.e. mayest thou not perish, though thou be distant from me. The Arabs say ابعدہ الله i.e. may God alienate him, or estrange him from good or prosperity; or may God curse him. بعد means, distance or remoteness; remoteness from probability or correctness i.e. improbability or strangeness; perdition or death; judgement and prudence; curse, execration or malediction. They say, بعدا له i.e. may he be cursed, or may God alienate him from good (Lane & Aqrab).

Commentary:

The verse makes it clear that water not only came out from the "fountains of the earth" (v. 41) but it also fell from the sky (i.e. the clouds) and thus both combined to deluge the land.

The mountain al-Judi is, according to Yaqut al-Hamwi, a long chain of mountains on the eastern side of the Tigris in the province of Mosul (Mu‘jam). According to Sale, "al-Judi is one of those mountains which divide Armenia on the south from Mesopotamia and that part of Assyria which is inhabited by the Curds, from whom the mountain took the name of Cardu or Gardu, but the Greeks turned it into Gordyaei...The tradition which affirms the ark to have rested on these mountains must have been very ancient, since it is the tradition of the Chaldeans themselves (Berosus, apud Joseph. Antiq.). To confirm it, we are told that the remainders of the ark were to be seen on the Gordyaean mountains. Berosus and Abydenus both declare that there was such a report in their time…The relics of the ark were also to be seen here in the time of Epiphanius and we are told the Emperor Heraclius went from the town of Thamanin up to the mountain al-Judi and saw the place of the ark. There was also formerly a famous monastery, called the monastery of the ark, upon some of these mountains where the Nestorians used to celebrate a feast-day on the spot where they supposed the ark rested; but in 776 A.D. that monastery was destroyed by lightning" (Sale, pp. 179, 180).

Again, "Judi (Djudi) is a lofty mountain mass in the district of Bohtan, about 25 miles N.E. of Jazirat ibn ‘Omar in 37°, 30΄ N. Lat…It owes its fame to the Mesopotamian tradition, which identifies it, and not Mount Ararat, with the mountain on which Noah’s ark rested. It is practically certain from a large number of Armenian and other writers that, down to the 10th century, Mt. Ararat was in no way connected with the Deluge. Ancient Armenian tradition certainly knows nothing of a mountain on which the ark rested; and when one is mentioned in later Armenian literature, this is clearly due to the gradually increasing influence of the Bible which makes the ark rest on the mountains (or a mountain) of Ararat. The highest and best known mountain there is Masik…The tradition that Masik was the mountain on which the Ark rested, only begins to find a place in Armenian literature in the 11th and 12th centuries. Older exegesis identified the mountain now called Judi, or according to Christian authorities the mountains of Gordyene, as the apobaterion of Noah (Enc. of Islam. Vol. 1, p. 1059).

Babylonian traditions also place the mount al-Judi in Armenia (Jew. Enc. under Ararat) and the Bible admits that Babylon was the place where the descendants of Noah lived (Gen. 11:9).

7:92; 11:68.

Important Words:

الصیحة (punishment) means, a loud cry; punishment, castigation, chastisement; a hostile or predatory incursion by which a tribe is surprised (Lane & Aqrab). See also 11:68.

غثاء (rubbish) is derived from غثاء (ghatha). They say غثا الوادی i.e. the valley has in it abundance of rubbish. غثت النفس i.e. the stomach heaved, or became agitated with a tendency to vomit. غثاء means, the rubbish or particles of things or refuse and scum and rotten leaves with the scum borne upon the surface of a torrent. The Arabs say ماله غثاء و عمله ھباء و سعیه خفاء i.e. his property is as rubbish borne by a torrent and his work is like motes that are seen in the rays of the sun and his labour is a thing that is unapparent. غثاء الناس means, the low and the vile and the refuse of mankind (Lane & Aqrab).

بعداً means, perdition or death; curse or malediction etc. The expression بعداله means, may he be cursed or may God alienate him from good (Lane & Aqrab). See also 11:45.

Commentary:

The verse points to a lesson to which history of religion generally and the Quran particularly draws attention, viz. that the opponents of God’s Prophets always meet with failure and destruction and believers whom they regard as the scum and dregs of humanity succeed in their mission and ultimately become the teachers and leaders of nations.