al-Ḥijr 15:39-40

Qāla Rabbi bimā aghwaytanī la-uzayyinanna lahum fī'l-arḍi wa la-ughwiyannahum ajmaʿīn · Illā ʿibādaka minhumu'l-mukhlaṣīn

"He said: 'My Lord! For Your having led me astray, I shall surely make things fair-seeming to them on the earth and shall surely lead them all astray · — except those of Your servants who have been made pure.'"

This is one of the strongest textual data of the sūra and needs to be given in a table.

The ز-ي-ن root and the verb tazyīn were treated in several places in the index. And in every place where it was treated, what was recorded was that the verb comes in the passive — that is, that the one who adorns is not named:

What the table shows is this, and I record it as my own reading, its ground being the differences of voice and person in the verbs:

One. The making of an evil deed fair-seeming is recounted in the Qurʾān with the passive pattern — in Fāṭir and in Ghāfir alike. In the section on Fāṭir this was recorded under the heading "the one who adorns is not named".

Two. The active pattern is used in two places, and in both the object is the sky — in al-Ṣāffāt and in the sixteenth verse of this sūra. That is, when the doer of the verb tazyīn is stated openly, it is attached to a good work.

Three. And the place in the Qurʾān where the verb is ascribed to Iblīs is here — and this is not a report but an undertaking out of Iblīs's own mouth.

Four. The verb comes with emphasis: la-uzayyinanna — the lām and the doubled nūn. That is, the strongest pattern of undertaking.

The sum of these four gives the following finding, and I record it as my own reading: the Qurʾān generally does not say by whom the making fair-seeming is done. And here the one who says it is not the text — it is the adorner himself. That is, the information is given not as an announcement but as a confession.

It is important to preserve this distinction: when the text recounts a person's seeing evil as beautiful, it gives no doer. The one who states the doer is the party declaring his own work.

The غ-و-ي root: to stray from the road, to go astray. Ghayy — the opposite of the right road, error.

The lexicographers differ over the function of the particle bimā:

Both are transmitted; I do not impose a preference.

And it must be recorded that the verb will return within the sūra: wa la-ughwiyannahum (39) → illā mani'ttabaʿaka mina'l-ghāwīn (42). The same root, one an undertaking and one a limit.

The خ-ل-ص root was analysed in detail at al-Zumar 39/1-3, and what was recorded there holds here too; I rely on that treatment:

The root: a thing's being separated from what has been mixed into it and becoming pure. The straining of oil or milk and its separation from its dregs is recounted with this root. That is, ikhlāṣ is not the adding of something — but the sifting out.

And in the section on al-Zumar two patterns were set out in a table:

Now a third pattern is added here, and the difference must be worked out:

The word in the verse is al-mukhlaṣīn — a passive participle.

I record this as my own reading, and its ground is the pattern itself: the group Iblīs leaves outside is named not as those who become pure by their own effort but as those who have been made pure. The doer of the verb is not in the sentence; but the pattern says that the work is done from outside.

And this agrees with the other half of the verse: ʿibādaka — "Your servants." The belonging is already stated.

A difference of variant reading is transmitted, and it bears directly on this distinction: the word has been read both as mukhlaṣīn (passive participle) and as mukhliṣīn (active participle). I give no imam's name. The two readings correspond to the two patterns above and change the sense markedly; I do not impose a preference.

The same word occurs at Ṣād 38/83 as well (illā ʿibādaka minhumu'l-mukhlaṣīn) — the same sentence in two sūras, to the letter. This is a repetition that can be verified.