Al-Fajr · Makki · ayah 25 of 30

Al-Fajr 89:25

فَيَوْمَئِذٍ لَّا يُعَذِّبُ عَذَابَهُۥٓ أَحَدٌ

“So on that Day, none will punish [as severely] as His punishment,”

Saheeh International

Essence

The surah's tyrants built their fame on the pain they could inflict; on that Day, none punishes as He punishes.

A reflection

The torturer's reach

For eleven years, a department head kept his whole floor quiet with threats. A word from him could end a contract or ruin a reference, and everyone knew it. Then an audit found what he had been hiding. Security escorted him out in under ten minutes. The man everyone feared carried his own box to the lift.

This surah has shown you people who were feared. Pharaoh with his stakes. Nations that overflowed their banks and spread corruption through the lands. Their power was measured by the harm they could do.

Now comes a single sentence: fa-yawmaʾidhin lā yuʿadhdhibu ʿadhābahū aḥad. On that Day, none punishes as He punishes. One concise commentary puts it plainly. No one will be able to punish like Allah punishes those who disobey Him, or to bind as He binds, or reach anything near it.

One classical derivation links ʿadhāb to holding back. An animal that stood with its head raised, refusing food and water, was ʿādhib. Punishment, on that view, is being held back from every ease.

Set the tyrants' reach beside that. The most feared torturer in history could only harm a body, for a time, in one place. His power ended at the edge of his kingdom and the end of his life. The ego of a tyrant is built on a very small stage.

Is it proud for Allah to say so? A proud creature boasts to be feared. Allah needs no one's fear for His own sake; He is free of all need (35:15). He says it for two groups. For the victims of Pharaoh's stakes, it means that the pain they suffered was not the last word. For anyone tempted to build a little kingdom on fear, it means their reach is tiny.

The humble response is not terror, but relief and caution together. Relief, because no human power is final. Caution, because every one of us holds some small power to hurt. None of it will look large on that Day.

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.