Āl ʿImrān 3:187-189

Wa idh akhadha'llāhu mīthāqa'lladhīna ūtu'l-kitāba la-tubayyinunnahū li'n-nāsi wa lā taktumūnah, fa-nabadhūhu warāʾa ẓuhūrihim wa'shtaraw bihī thamanan qalīlā, fa-biʾsa mā yashtarūn · Lā taḥsabanna'lladhīna yafraḥūna bimā ataw wa yuḥibbūna an yuḥmadū bimā lam yafʿalū fa-lā taḥsabannahum bi-mafāzatin mina'l-ʿadhāb, wa lahum ʿadhābun alīm · Wa li'llāhi mulku's-samāwāti wa'l-arḍ, wa'llāhu ʿalā kulli shayʾin qadīr

"And when God took a covenant from those given the Book: 'You shall surely make it plain to people and shall not conceal it.' But they cast it behind their backs and sold it for a small price. How evil a bargain! · Do not suppose those who rejoice in what they have done and love to be praised for what they have not done to have escaped the punishment; theirs is a painful punishment. · To God belongs the dominion of the heavens and the earth; and God has power over all things."

And the two obligations are two faces of the same thing, but they are not the same: one commands a doing, the other a not-doing.

And the verb taktumūn occurred at verse 71: wa taktumūna'l-ḥaqqa wa antum taʿlamūn. Two occurrences, the same verb: one an actual state, the other a pledge taken. This is a repetition verifiable within the sūra.

And the note li'n-nās must be recorded: the making plain is to be done not to a group but to people. The same note was at verses 96, 110 and 138 as well.

نَبَذُوهُ وَرَآءَ ظُهُورِهِمْ — root ن-ب-ذ: to find a thing worthless and throw it away. And the description is concrete: warāʾa ẓuhūrihim — behind their backs.

I record this as an observation about the word: the description conveys not a refusal but a disregarding. What is thrown behind the back is not destroyed; it is put out of the field of vision. And this lies along the same line as the description labs (clothing over) at verse 71 — in both the object stays and becomes invisible.

And what the verse describes is two separate kinds of conduct, and they must be counted separately:

And the second is distinct from the other: what is at issue here is not an exaggeration but the taking of the recompense for something that is not there.

I record this as an observation about the word order: the sentence takes as its subject not being praised but being praised for what has not been done. And the verb is yuḥibbūna — "they love": that is, something at the level of desire is being named.

مَفَازَة — root ف-و-ز: deliverance, attaining what is sought. And the same root had occurred three verses earlier: fa-qad fāza (185). Two occurrences, three verses apart:

This is a repetition verifiable within the sūra.

And the verb lā taḥsabanna occurs twice in the verse — this is the last occurrence of the root ح-س-ب in the sūra and the last of the six.