4. Sura an-Nisa
The Quranic Text & Ali’s Version:
أَيْنَمَا
تَكُونُواْ
يُدْرِككُّمُ
الْمَوْتُ
وَلَوْ
كُنتُمْ
فِي
بُرُوجٍ
مُّشَيَّدَةٍ...
4: 78. "Wherever ye are, death will find you out, even if ye are in towers built up strong and high!"
... وَإِن تُصِبْهُمْ حَسَنَةٌ يَقُولُواْ هَـذِهِ مِنْ عِندِ اللّهِ...
If some good befalls them, they say, "This is from Allah;"
... وَإِن تُصِبْهُمْ سَيِّئَةٌ يَقُولُواْ هَـذِهِ مِنْ عِندِكَ...
but if evil, they say, "This is from thee"
... قُلْ كُلًّ مِّنْ عِندِ اللّهِ...
(O Prophet). "Say: "All things are from Allah.
C597. The Hypocrites were inconsistent, and in this reflect unregenerate mankind.
If a disaster happens, due to their own folly, they blame somebody else; but if they are fortunate, they claim reflected credit by pretending that Heaven has favoured them because of their own superior merits.
The modern critic discards even this pretence, eliminates Heaven altogether, and claims all credit direct to himself, unless he brings in blind Chance, but that he does mostly to "explain" misfortune.
If we look to the ultimate Cause of all things, all things come from Allah. But if we look to the proximate cause of things, our own merit is so small, that we can hardly claim credit for good ourselves with any fairness.
In Allah's hand is all good: 3:26. On the other hand, the proximate cause of our evil is due to some wrong in our own inner selves; for never are we dealt with unjustly in the very least: 4:77.
... فَمَا لِهَـؤُلاء الْقَوْمِ لاَ يَكَادُونَ يَفْقَهُونَ حَدِيثًا ﴿٧٨﴾
But what hath come to these people, that they fail to understand a single fact?
Asad’s Version:
(4:78)
Wherever
you may be, death will overtake you - even though you be in towers
raised high.
"Yet, when a good thing happens to them, some [people] say, "This is from God,"whereas when evil befalls them, they say, "This is from thee [O fellowman]!"92 Say: "All is from God."
What, then, is amiss with these people that they are in no wise near to grasping the truth of what they are told?93
Yuksel’s Version:
4:78 Wherever you may be, death will find you, even if you are in fortified towers. If any good befalls them, they say, "This is from God," and if any bad befalls them, they say, "This is from you!" Say, "All is from God;" what is wrong with these people, they barely understand anything said!
[[ Asad’s notes -
92 I.e., they do not realize that the evil happening may possibly be a consequence of their
own actions or their own wrong choice between several courses open to them, but are prone to attribute it to the failings of others.
93 Lit., "something [which they are] told" - i.e., a truth which their own reason as well as the teachings of all the prophets should have made obvious to them.
94
There is no contradiction between this statement and the preceding
one that "all is from God". In the world-view of the
Qur'an, God is the ultimate source of all happening: consequently,
all good that comes to man and all evil that befalls him flows, in
the last resort, from
God's will. However, not everything that
man regards as "evil fortune" is really, in its
final
effect, evil - for, "it may well be that you hate a thing the
while it is good for you,
and it may well be that you love a
thing the while it is bad for you: and God knows,
whereas you
do not know" (2:216). Thus, many an apparent "evil"
may sometimes be no more
than a trial and a God-willed means of
spiritual growth through suffering, and need not
necessarily be
the result of a wrong choice or a wrong deed on the part of the
person thus
afflicted. It is, therefore, obvious that the
"evil" or "evil fortune" of which this verse
speaks has a restricted connotation, inasmuch as it refers to
evil in the moral sense of
the word: that is to say, to
suffering resulting from the actions or the behaviour of the
person
concerned, and this in accordance with the natural law of cause and
effect which
God has decreed for all His creation, and which
the Qur'an describes as "the way of God"
(sunnat
Allah). For all such suffering man has only himself to blame, since
"God does not
wrong
anyone by as much as at atom's weight" (4:40).