And that ye are triflers?
Prostrate yourselves then to God and worship.
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1 This Sura was revealed at about the time of the first emigration of Muhammad's followers to Abyssinia, A. 5. The manner in which the Prophet cancelled the objectionable verses 19, 20, is the strongest proof of his sincerity (as also is the opening of Sura 1xxx.) at this period. Had he not done so, nothing would have been easier for him than to have effected a reconciliation with the powerful party in Mecca, who had recently compelled his followers to emigrate.
2 The Angel Gabriel, to the meaning of whose name, as the strong one of God, these words probably allude.
3 That is, Beyond which neither men nor angels can pass (Djelal). The original word is also rendered, the Lote-Tree of the extremity, or of the loftiest spot in Paradise, in the seventh Heaven, on the right hand of the throne of God. Its leaves are fabled to be as numerous as the members of the whole human family, and each leaf to bear the name of an individual. This tree is shaken on the night of the 15th of Ramadan every year a little after sunset, when the leaves on which are inscribed the names of those who are to die in the ensuing year fall, either wholly withered, or with more or less green remaining, according to the months or weeks the person has yet to live.
4 The Sidrah is a prickly plum, which is called Ber in India, the zizyphus Jujuba of Linnæus. A decoction of the leaves is used in India to wash the dead, on account of the sacredness of the tree.
5 Hosts of adoring angels, by which the tree was masked.
6 Al-Lat or El-Lat, probably the Alilat of Herodotus (iii. 8) was an idol at Nakhlah, a place east of the present site of Mecca. Al-Ozza was an idol of the Kinanah tribe; but its hereditary priests were the Banu Solaym, who were stationed along the mercantile road to Syria in the neighbourhood of Chaibar.
7 When at the first recital of this Sura, the prophet had reached this verse, he continued,