إِنَّ ٱلَّذِينَ يَخْشَوْنَ رَبَّهُم بِٱلْغَيْبِ لَهُم مَّغْفِرَةٌ وَأَجْرٌ كَبِيرٌ
Inna'lladhīna yakhshawna rabbahum bi'l-ghaybi lahum maghfiratun wa ajrun kabīr "As for those who fear their Lord unseen: for them there is forgiveness and a great reward."
The sūra's first and only counter-picture. After eleven verses of a scene of punishment, a single verse of good news.
| Word | What it describes |
|---|---|
| خَوْف (khawf) | General fear; the expectation of a harm. Its object is concrete |
| خَشْيَة (khashya) | Fear joined with knowledge; the drawing back felt because one has grasped the greatness |
| رَهْبَة (rahba) | Alarm, dread; fear that makes one flee |
| وَجَل (wajal) | The trembling of the heart |
The distinguishing side of khashya is that it rests on knowledge. The Qurʾān says this openly: "Of His servants, only those who know feel khashya towards God" (Fāṭir 35/28).
This connects directly with the tenth verse of the sūra. There what was lacking was hearing and reasoning — that is, the two channels of knowledge. Here what is praised is the fear that knowledge produces.
That is, two verses apart the sūra has set this up, as my own reading: the person without knowledge does not fear; the person with knowledge fears. Fear here is not the result of ignorance but the result of knowledge.
This turns round a widespread opinion about the notion of fear. A claim often used in the criticism of religion is this: fear is born of ignorance, and as knowledge increases fear decreases. The verse says the reverse — and the kind of fear it speaks of is different: not the fear that makes one flee, but the fear that gives measure.
| Reading | Its meaning | Its ground |
|---|---|---|
| Without seeing | They fear Him although they do not see Him | Ghayb means "what cannot be reached by the senses"; at al-Baqara 2/3 yuʾminūna bi'l-ghayb is in the same sense |
| In secret | They fear even when nobody is watching | Ghayb here looks at the person's own condition: in the moments when he is out of sight |
The two readings do not exclude each other and both come out at the same principle: to act without a supervising eye.
On the first reading the supervisor is not seen; on the second the supervisor is supposed absent. In both the test is the same: conduct towards what is unseen.
And this connects directly with the next verse of the sūra (13): "Whether you keep your speech secret or make it public, He knows the very substance of the breasts." That is, the twelfth verse praises the one who fears in secret, and the thirteenth verse says that there is no such thing as secret.
The link with al-Baqara 2/3. There the first quality of those who guard themselves was "faith in the unseen". Here the same expression is framed with khashya. Read together, the two verses bring out the two faces of the relation with the unseen: to believe and to draw back. One is acceptance, the other conduct.
The logic of the order is this: forgiveness looks at the past (there was something that needed covering), reward looks at the future (there is a return to be given). That is, first the account is cleared, then the prize is given.
This order agrees with the pair of names in the second verse: there al-ʿAzīzu'l-Ghafūr was said — power and covering. Here the same covering is mentioned by way of its outcome.
And the adjective kabīr is striking: in the ninth verse the words the deniers said to the messenger were "ḍalālin kabīr" — "great error". The same adjective is used here for the reward: ajrun kabīr.
That the same word is used three verses apart, once for an accusation and once for a recompense, stands in the text. The meaning I draw from it is my own reading: the sūra is comparing who applies the adjective "great" to what.