Ḥāṭib and the Veterans of Badr
بِسْمِ ٱللَّهِ ٱلرَّحْمَـٰنِ ٱلرَّحِيمِ يَـٰٓأَيُّهَا ٱلَّذِينَ ءَامَنُوا۟ لَا تَتَّخِذُوا۟ عَدُوِّى وَعَدُوَّكُمْ أَوْلِيَآءَ تُلْقُونَ إِلَيْهِم بِٱلْمَوَدَّةِ وَقَدْ كَفَرُوا۟ بِمَا جَآءَكُم مِّنَ ٱلْحَقِّ يُخْرِجُونَ ٱلرَّسُولَ وَإِيَّاكُمْ ۙ أَن تُؤْمِنُوا۟ بِٱللَّهِ رَبِّكُمْ إِن كُنتُمْ خَرَجْتُمْ جِهَـٰدًا فِى سَبِيلِى وَٱبْتِغَآءَ مَرْضَاتِى ۚ تُسِرُّونَ إِلَيْهِم بِٱلْمَوَدَّةِ وَأَنَا۠ أَعْلَمُ بِمَآ أَخْفَيْتُمْ وَمَآ أَعْلَنتُمْ ۚ وَمَن يَفْعَلْهُ مِنكُمْ فَقَدْ ضَلَّ سَوَآءَ ٱلسَّبِيلِ
(60:1) O you who have faith! Do not take My enemy and your enemy for friends, [secretly] offering them affection, if you have set out for jihad in My way and to seek My pleasure, for they have certainly denied whatever has come to you of the truth, expelling the Apostle and you, because you have faith in Allah, your Lord. You secretly nourish affection for them, while I know well whatever you hide and whatever you disclose, and whoever among you does that has certainly strayed from the right way.
The question
When Ḥāṭib ibn Abī Baltaʿa wrote secretly to the Quraysh, was he spared because God had told the veterans of Badr “Do as you like, for I have forgiven you”?
Views answered: the report that the veterans of Badr were told “Do as you like, for I have forgiven you”
Al-Mizan's argument
The verse was revealed about Ḥāṭib ibn Abī Baltaʿa, who wrote to the Quraysh before the conquest of Mecca. Imam ʿAlī's report, also transmitted from many Companions, has the Prophet spare him because he fought at Badr, and God telling the veterans of Badr: “Do as you like, for I have forgiven you.” Al-Mizan shows this cannot be right. The Prophet himself applied the ḥadd to Misṭaḥ, a veteran of Badr, after the slander of ʿĀʾishah. A licence to do anything would lift every religious duty from them, forgive sins that only repentance can remove, exempt them from the whole Sharīʿa and from commanding good and forbidding wrong, and would apply above all to the Prophet, the chief of the veterans of Badr. And the verses of al-Mumtaḥana, revealed about this very event, rebuke Ḥāṭib's act.
Reading guide
Each part opens the commentary at that point.
- Ḥāṭib's letter to the Quraysh
- A report from many Companions
- Spared because he fought at Badr?
- Contradicted by the punishment of Misṭaḥ
- It would lift every religious duty from them
- Sins that only repentance can remove
- The Sharīʿa would not apply to them
- Against the purpose of religion
- It would apply above all to the Prophet
- The verses of al-Mumtaḥana themselves