كَذَٰلِكَ ۖ وَأَوْرَثْنَٰهَا قَوْمًا ءَاخَرِينَ
| Reading | What it says |
|---|---|
| It attaches to what precedes | "So it was" — it closes the list in 25-27 |
| It attaches to what follows | "So it was — We made another people inherit" — it qualifies the manner of the inheriting |
| The predicate of an elided subject | "The matter is thus" |
I record one datum, and it is a repetition within the sūra: the same word occurs in the same position in the fifty-fourth verse as well — at the head of the sentence, followed by wāw and a first person plural verb:
| Verse | Expression | Verb |
|---|---|---|
| 28 | kadhālika wa awrathnāhā qawman ākharīn | We made inherit |
| 54 | kadhālika wa zawwajnāhum bi-ḥūrin ʿīn | We paired |
The two sentences are in the same pattern: kadhālika + wāw + a verb of the faʿalnā pattern + a pronoun + an object.
I record this as a verifiable repetition within the sūra. And what is interpretation is this, which I give as my own reading: the two sentences stand at the same place in the two tableaux — one closing the list of the house of Pharaoh, the other closing the list of the muttaqīn. In the one there is a passing out of hand, in the other a joining together.
The root occurred in al-Ḥadīd and al-Fajr. Its concrete sense: the passing of a man's property to another after his death. Wārith — the one to whom the property passes; mīrāth — the thing that passes.
The choice of word is worth recording, and I give this as my own reading: the verse does not say "We gave" (aʿṭaynā) or "it passed into the hands of others". It says "We made them inherit".
The idea the word "inheritance" carries is this: the property changes hands but itself remains. The owner goes, the possession stays. The garden is still there, the spring is still flowing — the only thing that changes is whose it is.
And this prepares the logic of the next verse (29): if the garden is still standing and only its owner has gone, it becomes possible to ask whether anything at all was lessened by his going. The twenty-ninth verse will answer exactly this question.
I record this as an observation about word order: the text does not name the heir. The stress lies not on the heir but on the fact that the inheritance has changed hands.