Sura 22, al-Hajj, Medina 103
The Quranic Text & Ali’s Translation:
لَن يَنَالَ اللَّهَ لُحُومُهَا وَلَا دِمَاؤُهَا وَلَكِن يَنَالُهُ التَّقْوَى مِنكُمْ...
22: 37. It is not their meat nor their blood, that reaches God: it is your piety that reaches Him:
...كَذَلِكَ سَخَّرَهَا لَكُمْ لِتُكَبِّرُوا اللَّهَ عَلَى مَا هَدَاكُمْ...
He has thus made them subject to you, that ye may glorify God for His guidance to you:
...وَبَشِّرِ الْمُحْسِنِينَ ﴿٣٧﴾
and proclaim the Good News to all who do right.
Lan yanala Allaha luhoomuha wala dimaoha walakin yanaluhu alttaqwa minkum kathalika sakhkharaha lakum litukabbiroo Allaha AAala ma hadakum wabashshiri almuhsineena
Asad
[But bear in mind:] never does their flesh reach God, and neither their blood: it is only your God-consciousness that reaches Him. It is to this end that We have made them subservient to your needs, so that you might glorify God for all the guidance with which He has graced you. And give thou this glad tiding unto the doers of good:
Pickthall:
Their flesh and their food reach not Allah, but the devotion from you reacheth Him. Thus have We made them subject unto you that ye may magnify Allah that He hath guided you. And give good tidings (O Muhammad) to the good.
Their flesh and blood do not reach God: it is your piety that reaches Him. Thus God has subjected them to you, so that you may glorify Him for the guidance He has given you. Give glad tidings to those who do good
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Ali’s Comments:
2815. The essence of sacrifice has been explained in n. 2810.
No one should suppose that meat or blood is acceptable to the One True God. It was a Pagan fancy that Allah could be appeased by blood sacrifice. But Allah does accept the offering of our hearts, and as a symbol of such offer, some visible institution is necessary.
He has given us power over the brute creation, and permitted us to eat meat, but only if we pronounce His name at the solemn act of taking life, for without this solemn invocation, we are apt to forget the sacredness of life.
By the invocation we are reminded that wanton cruelty is not in our thoughts, but only the need of food. Now if we further deny the greater part of the food (some theologians fix the proportion at three-quarters or two-thirds) for the sake of our poorer brethren in solemn assembly in the precincts of the Haram (sacred territory), our symbolic act finds practical expression in benevolence, and that is the virtue sought to be taught.
We should be grateful to Allah for His guidance in this matter, in which many Peoples have gone wrong, and we should proclaim the true doctrine so that virtue and charity may increase among men.
Asad’s Comments:
57 Lit, "inasmuch as they have been wronged". Connecting with the promise, in the precedin] verse, that "God will ward off [all evil] from those who attain to faith", the present verse enunciates the permission to fight physically in self-defence. All relevant Traditions (quoted, particular, by Tabari and Ibn Kathir) show that this is the earliest Qur'anic reference to th problem of war as such. According to Abd Allih ibn Abbas, it was revealed immediately after thE Prophet left Mecca for Medina, i.e., at the beginning of the year 1 H. The principle of war ii self-defence - and only in self-defence - has been further elaborated in Al-Baqarah, which was revealed about
a year later (see 2: 1 90- 1 93 and the corresponding notes).
58 Lit., "were it not that God repels some people by means of others" (cf the identical phrase in the second paragraph of 2:251).