At-Tur · Makki · ayah 40 of 49

At-Tur 52:40

أَمْ تَسْـَٔلُهُمْ أَجْرًا فَهُم مِّن مَّغْرَمٍ مُّثْقَلُونَ

“Or do you, [O Muḥammad], ask of them a payment, so they are by debt burdened down?”

Saheeh International

Essence

They paid their chiefs and soothsayers gladly, yet turned from the one man who asked them for nothing at all.

A reflection

Paying the ones who take

A classical commentator noticed a sharp irony in this question. The Prophet ﷺ is told, in effect: you do not ask them for a wage, and they do not follow you. Others ask them, and they follow those others. Their chiefs and leaders took from them, and they obeyed. The one who gave freely, they rejected. He called this the height of misguidance.

The pattern survives. People often trust what they pay for and doubt what is offered free. A price feels like a guarantee.

Picture a young woman who pays a large fee for an online confidence course run by a stranger with a glossy profile. She watches every video. Meanwhile her grandmother, who raised five children through hard years, tells her the same truths over tea every Sunday, for nothing. She smiles politely and checks her phone.

The ayah does not say that every paid adviser is false. It says that the absence of a fee removes one great reason for suspicion. The Prophet ﷺ gained nothing from their belief. If he was wrong, he was wrong at his own cost.

The full entry has 2 more reflections, questions to sit with, and "Live it today" - with the words, the roots and the tafsir alongside. Free, no account, works offline.