Al-Baqarah · Madani · ayah 15 of 286

Al-Baqarah 2:15

ٱللَّهُ يَسْتَهْزِئُ بِهِمْ وَيَمُدُّهُمْ فِى طُغْيَـٰنِهِمْ يَعْمَهُونَ

“[But] Allāh mocks them and prolongs them in their transgression [while] they wander blindly.”

Saheeh International

Essence

The mockers think they are the audience; Allah turns their mockery back on them and lets their excess run on while they wander in circles.

A reflection

The last laugh is not yours

Mockery always puts the mocker above. The one who laughs sits in the audience; the one laughed at is on stage. That is part of its pleasure. The hypocrites of the previous ayah enjoyed exactly that seat. In private they told their allies that their public faith was a joke, and the believers were the fools who fell for it.

This ayah turns the theatre round in four words. Allāhu yastahziʾu bihim: Allah mocks them. The sentence begins with Allah's name, not with a verb. And the verb is in the present tense, ongoing. The mockers who thought they held the seats discover they have been on stage all along.

The ego is most exposed in mockery, because mockery is pride dressed as humour. It says: I see through this, I am above it. The ayah answers that no creature is above anything. The one who looks down on faith is himself being looked at, by the One who sees every private room.

A thoughtful reader may object that mocking seems beneath God. Surely the Most High does not trade insults? The sources answer carefully. A concise commentary explains that He requites their mockery. One translation adds a note: He mocks them in response to their mocking the Muslims. One lexicon calls this the view most favoured by the language scholars. The requital is named after the sin, as in 'the recompense of an evil is an evil like it' (42:40). The second is not an evil at all. It is justice, given the same name because it answers the first.

An early commentator points to a scene the Quran describes. On the Day of Judgement the hypocrites call to the believers: wait for us, let us take some of your light. They are told: go back and look for light. A wall is set between them, with a door, mercy on one side and punishment on the other (57:13). The ones who laughed at the believers' faith will beg for its light.

There is humility here for all of us. Before you laugh at another person's sincerity, remember who is watching both of you.

The full entry has 6 more reflections, questions to sit with, and "Live it today" - with the words, the roots and the tafsir alongside. Free, no account, works offline.