Taha · Makki · ayah 95 of 135

Taha 20:95

قَالَ فَمَا خَطْبُكَ يَـٰسَـٰمِرِىُّ

“[Moses] said, "And what is your case, O Sāmirī?"”

Saheeh International

Essence

Three words to the man behind it all, what is your story, Sāmirī, show that even the instigator is heard before he is sentenced.

A reflection

Heard before he is judged

Then what is your affair, Sāmirī? By now Musa knew what al-Sāmirī had done. Allah had told him on the Mount: al-Sāmirī led them astray (20:85). The people had described the gold and the throwing. The calf stood in the middle of the camp.

And still Musa asked.

The commentaries describe the question as a request for the cause. A narration-based commentary glosses it: what drove you to what you did, and what came over you that you did it? A concise commentary: what is your situation, and what pushed you to do this? An early report: what is this business that you have entered into?

Only after al-Sāmirī answers (20:96) does Musa pronounce his sentence (20:97). The order matters. Even the man most responsible for the worst sin in the story was given a chance to speak before he was judged.

That is a principle of justice the Quran repeats in many places, and here it is applied in the hardest case. It is easy to hear out people we sympathise with. It is much harder to ask the obvious culprit for his account, when the verdict already seems certain.

Picture a head teacher after a serious fight in which a younger boy was hurt. She has CCTV, three witness statements and a name. Still, before she decides on an exclusion, she sits down with the boy who started it. She asks him what happened, from the beginning. He tells a story that does not excuse him. But it reveals that an older cousin had been paying him to pick fights. The exclusion still happens. So does a phone call to the police about the cousin.

Asking does not mean the answer will change the verdict. It means the verdict will be built on the whole truth. Musa's three words, fa-mā khaṭbuka, are a small monument to that principle.

The full entry has 5 more reflections, questions to sit with, and "Live it today" - with the words, the roots and the tafsir alongside. Free, no account, works offline.