11:100 Hud (Hud)

ولما ذكر قصص هؤلاء الأمم مع رسلهم، قال الله تعالى لرسوله: { ذَلِكَ مِنْ أَنْبَاءِ الْقُرَى نَقُصُّهُ عَلَيْكَ ْ} لتنذر به، ويكون آية على رسالتك، وموعظة وذكرى للمؤمنين. { مِنْهَا قَائِمٌ ْ} لم يتلف، بل بقي من آثار ديارهم، ما يدل عليهم، { وَ ْ} منها { حَصِيدٌ ْ} قد تهدمت مساكنهم، واضمحلت منازلهم، فلم يبق لها أثر.

لما ذكر تعالى خبر الأنبياء وما جرى لهم مع أممهم وكيف أهلك الكافرين ونجي المؤمنين قال "ذلك من أنباء القرى" أي أخبارهم "نقصه عليك منها قائم" أي عامر "وحصيد" أي هالك.

The Lesson taken from the Destroyed Towns

When Allah mentioned the story of the Prophets and what happened with them and their nations -- how He destroyed the disbelievers and saved the believers -- He goes on to say,

ذَلِكَ مِنْ أَنْبَآءِ الْقُرَى

(That is some of the news of the (population of ) towns) meaning, news of them

نَقُصُّهُ عَلَيْكَ مِنْهَا قَآئِمٌ

(which We relate unto you; of them, some are (still) standing,) This means still remaining.

وَحَصِيدٌ

(and some have been (already) reaped.) This means totally destroyed.

وَمَا ظَلَمْنَـهُمْ

(We wronged them not,) This means, "When We destroyed them."

وَلَـكِن ظَلَمُواْ أَنفُسَهُمْ

(but they wronged themselves.) their rejecting their Messengers and disbelieving in them.

فَمَا أَغْنَتْ عَنْهُمْ ءَالِهَتَهُمُ

(So their gods, profited them not...) This is referring to their idols that they used to worship and invoke.

مِن دُونِ اللَّهِ مِن شَىْءٍ

(other than Allah naught) the idols did not benefit them, nor did they save them when Allah's com- mand came for their destruction.

وَمَا زَادُوهُمْ غَيْرَ تَتْبِيبٍ

(nor did they add aught to them but destruction.) Mujahid, Qatadah and others said, "This means loss. Because the reason for their destruction and their ruin was that they followed those false gods. Therefore, they were losers in this life and the Hereafter."

That which is mentioned dhālika is the subject the predicate of which follows is something of the tidings of the towns which We relate to you O Muhammad (s). Some of them that is of the towns are standing only its inhabitants having been destroyed and some of them have been cut down destroyed together with its inhabitants such that there are no vestiges thereof much like crops harvested with sickles.

After having given this good counsel to them, he warned them of the punishment of Allah Ta` ala. He said:

وَيَا قَوْمِ لَا يَجْرِ‌مَنَّكُمْ شِقَاقِي أَن يُصِيبَكُم مِّثْلُ مَا أَصَابَ قَوْمَ نُوحٍ أَوْ قَوْمَ هُودٍ أَوْ قَوْمَ صَالِحٍ ۚ وَمَا قَوْمُ لُوطٍ مِّنكُم بِبَعِيدٍ

And 0 my people, let not your hostility towards me cause you to suffer what was suffered by the people of Nuh, or the people of Hud, or the people of Salih. And the people of Lut are not far from you.

The sense of the last sentence is that the overturned habitations of the people of Sayyidna Lut (علیہ السلام) were close to Madyan where they were. Then, in terms of time, the punishment that came upon them was very close. From this they could learn their lesson and leave their obstinacy.

Hearing this, his people were enraged. They said that had it not been for the support he had from his clan, they would have stoned him to death. Despite this threat, Sayyidna Shu'aib (علیہ السلام) true to his mettle as a prophet, did not hesitate to tell them that they feared his clan all right, but would have no fear of Allah who holds everything in His power.

Finally, when his people did not listen to anything said to them, Sayyidna Shu'aib (علیہ السلام) told them that they could now wait for the punishment. After that, Allah Ta ala took out Sayyidna Shu'aib (علیہ السلام) and those who had believed in him, as is the Divine practice, from that habitation and the rest of them were destroyed instantly at the harsh Cry of Sayyidna Jibra'il (علیہ السلام) .

Injunctions and Rulings:

Rules about Lessening of Weights and Measures

One of the reasons why punishment fell on the people of Sayyidna Shu'aib (علیہ السلام) was their practice of weighing and measuring less than due - called tatfif. The Holy Qur'an has described the severe punishment for those who do that in Surah al-Mutaffifin which opens with the verse: وَيْلٌ لِّلْمُطَفِّفِينَ (Woe to those who give less - 83:1). There is a consensus of the entire Muslim Ummah that doing so is strictly Haram (unlawful). Quoting a saying of Sayyidna ` Umar ؓ ، Imam Malik has said in Mu'atta' that weighing and measuring less essentially means that someone does not fulfill the right of another person due on him, fully and duly. In fact, makes it less, whether it happens to be something given by weight, or measure, or something of another kind. If an employee falls short in performing his or her assigned duty, or an office worker, or a laborer cuts his working hours short, or fails to fulfill his job assignment as due, then, they all will be counted in this cat-egory. Anyone who does not perform his or her Salah with due consideration of everything obligatory and mash En in it has also committed the crime of this ` tatfif.' May Allah keep all of us protected from it!

Ruling

It appears in Tafsir al-Qurtubi that the people of Sayyidna Shu'aib (علیہ السلام) would save gold and silver by trimming the edges of gold and silver coins, like dinar and dirham, circulating in the country as official currency, and which they would channel back into circulation at par value. Sayyidna Shu'aib (علیہ السلام) prohibited them from doing so.

In Hadith as well, the Holy Prophet ﷺ has declared the chipping of the coins of an Islamic state to be Haram (unlawful). Tafsir authority, Zayd ibn Aslam has said exactly this while explaining the

verse of the Qur'an: تِسْعَةُ رَ‌هْطٍ يُفْسِدُونَ فِي الْأَرْ‌ضِ وَلَا يُصْلِحُونَ ; (nine family heads spreading corruption in the land and not correcting [ their ways ] - 27:48). He says that these people of the city mentioned in the verse used to chip off gold and silver from dinar and dirham coins and ran a profitable business of their own through this source - something the Qur'an calls a great corruption.

During the Khilafah of Sayyidna ` Umar ibn ` Abd al-` Aziz (رح) ، someone was arrested while he was cutting a dirham coin. He was awarded a punishment of lashes and was paraded around head shaved. (Tafsir al Qurtubi)