وَهُوَ ٱلْقَاهِرُ فَوْقَ عِبَادِهِۦ وَيُرْسِلُ عَلَيْكُمْ حَفَظَةً … قُلْ هُوَ ٱلْقَادِرُ عَلَىٰٓ أَن يَبْعَثَ عَلَيْكُمْ عَذَابًا مِّن فَوْقِكُمْ أَوْ مِن تَحْتِ أَرْجُلِكُمْ أَوْ يَلْبِسَكُمْ شِيَعًا وَيُذِيقَ بَعْضَكُم بَأْسَ بَعْضٍ
"He is the Subduer over His servants, and He sends keepers over you… Say: 'He has the power to send upon you a punishment from above you or from beneath your feet, or to confound you into factions and make some of you taste the violence of others.'"
| Possibility | From where |
|---|---|
| 1 | Min fawqikum — from above |
| 2 | Min taḥti arjulikum — from below |
| 3 | Aw yalbisakum shiyaʿan wa yudhīqa baʿḍakum baʾsa baʿḍ — from within |
I record this as my own reading, and its ground is the difference of the third: the first two are a disaster coming from outside; the third is the community's dividing within itself. And the verse counts all three in the same list.
The word shiyaʿ will occur once more in the 159th verse of this sūra (wa kānū shiyaʿā) and it was treated at al-Qaṣaṣ 28/4 as Pharaoh's dividing of his people. Three occurrences: possibility, act, outcome.
يَلْبِسَكُمْ — root ل-ب-س: to confuse, to cover (the sense of clothing comes from this root too). The root was treated at al-Baqara 2/42 (wa lā talbisu'l-ḥaqqa bi'l-bāṭil).
The link between وَهُوَ ٱلَّذِى يَتَوَفَّىٰكُم بِٱلَّيْلِ (60) and this block is worth recording: keepers are sent, but when the term is up the tawaffā comes (ḥattā idhā jāʾa aḥadakumu'l-mawtu tawaffathu rusulunā, 61).