Al-'Ankabut · Makki · ayah 12 of 69

Al-'Ankabut 29:12

وَقَالَ ٱلَّذِينَ كَفَرُوا۟ لِلَّذِينَ ءَامَنُوا۟ ٱتَّبِعُوا۟ سَبِيلَنَا وَلْنَحْمِلْ خَطَـٰيَـٰكُمْ وَمَا هُم بِحَـٰمِلِينَ مِنْ خَطَـٰيَـٰهُم مِّن شَىْءٍ ۖ إِنَّهُمْ لَكَـٰذِبُونَ

“And those who disbelieve say to those who believe, "Follow our way, and we will carry your sins."[1126] But they will not carry anything of their sins. Indeed, they are liars.”

Saheeh International

Essence

'Follow our way and we will carry your sins' is a guarantee no one can honour, and Allah names the people who offer it liars.

A reflection

A guarantee from men who denied the debt

Outside a sold-out stadium, a tout sells a ticket at three times its price. He is generous with promises. If the gate turns you away, he says, find me and I will refund every penny. By kick-off he has gone, and so has his phone number.

A careful reader of this ayah notices something odd in its grammar. The offer is phrased as a command: wa-l-naḥmil khaṭāyākum, 'and let us carry your sins'. A command is neither true nor false. You cannot call an instruction a lie. Yet the ayah ends: innahum la-kādhibūn, 'they are liars'.

The grammarians solved it early. The form is a command, but the meaning is a condition and its result. If you follow our way, we will carry your sins. That is a statement about the future, and statements can be false. One commentator draws the lesson that a command can carry a hidden claim inside it. Allah judged the claim, not the grammar.

A linguistic commentator then raises a sharper objection. Someone who guarantees what he later cannot deliver is not usually called a liar. He promised in good faith and failed. Why the harsh word?

He gives two answers. First, Allah knew they had no way at all to deliver. A guarantee with nothing behind it is a false statement about what the guarantor holds. Second, their hearts were not in it. The early reports explain how. The Quraysh leaders said: we will not be raised, and nor will you. If anything comes of it, it is on us. They offered to carry a debt they did not believe existed.

That is the tout exactly. He does not expect to be found, so he promises freely. Offers to absorb the consequences of a wrong are often made most loudly by those who deny the consequences are real. The confidence of the guarantee tells you nothing about the guarantor. It may tell you only how little he thinks he will ever have to pay.

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.