Circumstances of Revelation
Place: Medina. → Introduction
Time: Between the Hijrah and the Battle of Badr. Al-Mizan infers this from the sūrah itself: it addresses the polytheists with warnings, like the sūrahs revealed before the Hijrah, at a time when they still had power; and it addresses the believers on prayer, the hajj and permission to fight, showing that they had just established their community and had some men, weapons and fighting strength. The details of the laws had not yet been prescribed, apart from a few such as prayer and the hajj. → Introduction · Commentary on verse 15
Verses 1–2: ʿImrān b. Ḥuṣayn reports that they were revealed while the Prophet was on a journey. Al-Mizan: the report comes through several chains with differences of wording, and this version is the most reliable. → Narrations
Verses 3 and 8: Abū Mālik reports that verse 3 was revealed about al-Naḍr b. al-Ḥārith; Mujāhid says it was verse 8. Al-Mizan: such reports are apparently an application of the verse, as with most narrations about occasions of revelation; Mujāhid's is more acceptable, since al-Naḍr was a leading figure and verse 8 is about leaders, verse 3 about followers. → Narrations
Verse 11 (he who serves Allah on the edge): Ibn ʿAbbās reports that it was revealed about Bedouins who came to the Prophet and accepted Islam, then judged the religion good or bad by whether their year brought rain, crops and offspring. → Narrations
Verse 19 (These are two adversaries…): Abū Dharr swore that it was revealed about the six men who met in single combat at Badr: Ḥamzah b. ʿAbd al-Muṭṭalib, ʿUbaydah b. al-Ḥārith and ʿAlī b. Abī Ṭālib, against ʿUtbah b. Rabīʿah, Shaybah b. Rabīʿah and al-Walīd b. ʿUtbah. Al-Mizan: the report is also transmitted from Qays b. Saʿd b. ʿUbādah, Ibn ʿAbbās and others. In the commentary he takes the two adversaries to be the two groups described in verses 17–18. → Narrations · Commentary on verse 19
Verse 25: Ibn ʿAbbās reports that whoever shall desire therein any violation unjustly was revealed about ʿAbd-Allāh b. Anīs, who killed an Anṣārī companion on a mission, apostatized and fled to Mecca. Al-Mizan: this does not fit the context of the verse or connect its end with its beginning. Tafsīr al-Qummī says the verse was revealed about Quraysh when they barred the Prophet from Mecca. → Narrations
Verses 39–40, permission to fight: Imam al-Bāqir said the Prophet was not permitted to fight until Gabriel brought verse 39. Another report says the Muslims came to the Prophet beaten and tortured and he told them to be patient, for he had not been ordered to fight, until after the Hijrah this verse was revealed in Medina, the first revealed about fighting; al-Durr al-manthūr reports the same from Ibn ʿAbbās and others. Al-Mizan's view: it makes more sense that these verses were the first on jihad, rather than or , since they give explicit permission with promises of victory. Reports that they concern only the Emigrants are the narrators' interpretation; the verses are general. → Introduction · Narrations
Verse 52, the "cranes": Saʿīd b. Jubayr, Ibn ʿAbbās and a group of the Followers report that when the Prophet recited Sūrah al-Najm in Mecca, Satan cast onto his tongue words praising al-Lāt, al-ʿUzzā and Manāt, and this verse was revealed. Al-Mizan: though many hadith scholars, including Ibn Ḥajar, authenticated it, the decisive proofs of the Prophet's infallibility refute its content; and if Satan could insert words into the Qur'an, none of it could be trusted. → Narrations · Key Debate
Verses 58–60: Reports say verses 58–59 were revealed when Muslims asked what their reward would be if they died beside the Prophet without being slain, and that verse 60 concerned Meccan polytheists who attacked a group of Muslims two nights before the end of Muḥarram, thinking they would not fight in a sacred month. Al-Mizan: the report on verse 60 is clearly weak, since the polytheists too refrained from fighting in the sacred months, and other narrations on the story of ʿAbd-Allāh b. Jaḥsh weaken it further. → Narrations
A summary prepared from Tafsīr al-Mīzān: where and when the sūrah was revealed, and the occasions reported for its verses, with the ʿAllāmah's view of them. Each point links to the full discussion.