Az-Zukhruf · Makki · ayah 89 of 89

Az-Zukhruf 43:89

فَٱصْفَحْ عَنْهُمْ وَقُلْ سَلَـٰمٌ ۚ فَسَوْفَ يَعْلَمُونَ

“So turn aside from them and say, "Peace."[1456] But they are going to know.”

Saheeh International

Essence

Allah answers His Prophet's grief: turn your face from their fault, leave them with peace, and let the truth reveal itself.

A reflection

Turning the face, turning the page

Fa-ṣfaḥ ʿanhum: so turn aside from them, overlook them.

The root ṣ-f-ḥ means breadth and side. The ṣafḥa of a sword is its flat; of a face, its broad side. One lexicon explains ṣafaḥa ʿanhu as a figure: turning the side of the face away from someone's fault. The wrong is seen, and deliberately not stared at. Another lexicon offers a second picture: turning past the page on which the wrong was recorded, as one leafs on through a book.

The same root gives muṣāfaḥa, shaking hands: laying the flat of your palm against another's.

So ṣafḥ is a particular kind of forgiveness. It is not pretending nothing happened. It is choosing not to fix your eyes on it. Not tearing out the page, but turning past it.

One major early commentator says this is Allah's answer to the Prophet's complaint in the previous ayah. He had said: my Lord, these people will not believe. And Allah replied: then overlook them, and turn from their harm.

Picture a grandmother who notices, during a family visit, that her nine-year-old grandson has slipped a coin from her purse on the side table. Everyone else is chatting. She says nothing. Later, alone with him in the kitchen, she asks him to help her count the change in her purse. They count it together. He goes red, and quietly puts the coin back. She hugs him and says nothing more. She saw it, and she turned the page.

That is ṣafḥ at human scale. The fault is not denied; it is not dwelt on either. Dignity is preserved, and the relationship continues.

The Prophet ﷺ was being asked to do this with people who had mocked, rejected and plotted against him. It is the hardest kind of overlooking. And it is the last command of the surah: after all its arguments, turn the face, turn the page.

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.