وَلَقَدْ بَعَثْنَا فِى كُلِّ أُمَّةٍ رَّسُولًا أَنِ ٱعْبُدُوا۟ ٱللَّهَ وَٱجْتَنِبُوا۟ ٱلطَّٰغُوتَ فَمِنْهُم مَّنْ هَدَى ٱللَّهُ وَمِنْهُم مَّنْ حَقَّتْ عَلَيْهِ ٱلضَّلَٰلَةُ فَسِيرُوا۟ فِى ٱلْأَرْضِ فَٱنظُرُوا۟ كَيْفَ كَانَ عَٰقِبَةُ ٱلْمُكَذِّبِينَ
Wa laqad baʿathnā fī kulli ummatin rasūlan ani'budu'llāha wa'jtanibu'l-ṭāghūt, fa-minhum man hada'llāhu wa minhum man ḥaqqat ʿalayhi'l-ḍalāla, fa-sīrū fi'l-arḍi fa'nẓurū kayfa kāna ʿāqibatu'l-mukadhdhibīn
"We have surely raised up in every community a messenger: 'Serve God, and keep clear of the ṭāghūt.' Among them were some whom God guided, and some upon whom error was fixed. So travel through the earth and see what became of those who cried lies."
| Command | Form | Its direction |
|---|---|---|
| Uʿbudu'llāh | Imperative — do | Positive |
| Ijtanibu'l-ṭāghūt | Imperative — Form VIII, ijtināb | Keep clear of |
اجْتَنِبُوا۟ — root ج-ن-ب: side, flank. Janb — the flank; jānib — the side. In Form VIII (ijtanaba) it means "not to take a thing to one's side, to draw away from it".
The picture in the word is worth recording, and I give this as an observation about the language: the verse does not say "tear it down" or "reject it". It says "keep it away from your side." The command is thus not a command to destroy but a command about distance.
طَٰغُوت — root ط-غ-ي: to overstep the bound, to overflow. Ṭughyān — excess; ṭāghī — one who oversteps. Ṭāghūt is intensive in form, and the lexicographers record that the word is used for both singular and plural. The root was treated at al-Ḥāqqa, 69/5 (fa-uhlikū bi'l-ṭāghiya) and at al-Nāziʿāt, 79/17 (innahū ṭaghā).
It must be recorded: the verse gives a second answer to the defence of the thirty-fifth verse, and this answer is historical.
The defence was: "had God willed we would not have served them." The answer: to every community a messenger was sent.
I record this as my own reading, and its ground is that the two verses stand back to back: the verse does not debate the existence of the will as a theory. It announces as a fact that the knowledge was delivered. And the principle recorded at al-Isrāʾ, 17/15, is stated here from the other side: there it was wa mā kunnā muʿadhdhibīna ḥattā nabʿatha rasūlā (We do not punish until We have raised up a messenger); here it is announced that the messenger has been sent. The same principle was recorded at al-Qaṣaṣ, 28/59.
فَسِيرُوا۟ فِى ٱلْأَرْضِ — this proof was treated at many places in this commentary: al-Rūm 30/9 and 30/42, Fāṭir 35/44, Ghāfir (al-Muʾmin) 40/21 and 40/82, Muḥammad 47/10. I do not repeat it here. And what was recorded there holds here too: the proof is fetched not from a distant history but from the ruins that lie along the road.