Al-Buruj · Makki · ayah 10 of 22

Al-Buruj 85:10

إِنَّ ٱلَّذِينَ فَتَنُوا۟ ٱلْمُؤْمِنِينَ وَٱلْمُؤْمِنَـٰتِ ثُمَّ لَمْ يَتُوبُوا۟ فَلَهُمْ عَذَابُ جَهَنَّمَ وَلَهُمْ عَذَابُ ٱلْحَرِيقِ

“Indeed, those who have tortured[1898] the believing men and believing women and then have not repented will have the punishment of Hell, and they will have the punishment of the Burning Fire.”

Saheeh International

Essence

They burned His believers, and still the verdict waits on one clause, 'then did not repent': a door left open even for them.

A reflection

The door they could still have walked through

Read the ayah slowly, and notice where the weight falls. Those who persecuted the believing men and believing women, and then did not repent. The punishment is not hung on the fire alone. It is hung on the refusal that came after it.

One classical commentator draws the plain conclusion. Had they repented, they would have left this threat behind. So Allah accepts repentance, even from those who killed deliberately. One of the early Muslims could only marvel. Look at this generosity, he said. They killed His friends and burned them, and He invites them to repentance and forgiveness.

This was not theory for the first hearers. One classical reading applies the ayah to the persecutors of Makkah, and notes that 'then did not repent' fits them well. By the time it was revealed, some of them had already turned. Sahih al-Bukhari records Saʿīd ibn Zayd remembering how ʿUmar once tied him up, with ʿUmar's own sister, for becoming Muslim. That same ʿUmar became one of the pillars of Islam. Sahih Muslim records ʿAmr ibn al-ʿĀṣ on his deathbed. Once, he said, no one hated the Prophet ﷺ more than he did. When he came to pledge himself, he pulled back his hand and asked first to be forgiven. The Prophet ﷺ told him that Islam demolishes what came before it.

A woman in her thirties still thinks about a girl from her secondary school. For a whole year she led the group that tugged at that girl's headscarf every lunchtime. Nobody punished her. Now she prays herself, and the memory sits in her chest like a stone. She wonders whether a door like that ever reopens.

This ayah answers her. If the door stayed open for people who dug a trench and lit it, it is open for her.

And the turning is for her sake, not His. 'What would Allah do with your punishment, if you are grateful and believe?' (4:147). He gains nothing from our return. Tawba means coming back: you turn from the wrong road, and find He has already turned towards you. Many people today are fixed to their worst moment, as if a person could never move. This is a different kind of news. The file is not closed while you are still breathing.

The full entry has 4 more reflections, questions to sit with, and "Live it today" - with the words, the roots and the tafsir alongside. Free, no account, works offline.