The Holy Quran with Five Volume Commentary (Vol 2) — Page 217
PT. 5 AN-NISA' CH. 4 يَايُّهَا الَّذِينَ أُوتُوا الْكِتَبَ مِنُوا بِمَا نَزَّلْنَا !O ye People of the Book. 48 مُصَدِّقًا لِمَا مَعَكُمْ مِنْ قَبْلِ اَنْ نَّطْمِسَ believe in what We have sent down, fulfilling that which is some of the leaders and turn وُجُوْمًا فَنَرُدَّهَا عَلَى أَدْبَارِهَا أَو with you, before We destroy نَلْعَنَهُمْ كَمَا لَعَنَّا أَصْحُبَ السَّبْتِ them on their backs or curse وَكَانَ أَمْرُ اللهِ مَفْعُولًا them as "We cursed the People of the Sabbath. And the decree of Allah is bound to be carried Out. 522 a10:89. b2:66; 4:155; 7:164; 16:125. true Prophet of God, he would have certainly come to know of this. " 522. Important Words: visited with one kind of punishment and others with another. The expression: We will turn them on their backs, does not mean, as some commentators have thought, "We will physically disfigure them and put وجه leaders) is the plural of) وجوها which gives a number of meanings: face; the outward appearance of a person or thing; the front or the side that confronts the eyes of the looker; the first part of a thing; the leader or chief of a people; motive or intention, etc. (Aqrab). Commentary: This verse contains two prophecies concerning the Jews: (1) God will destroy their leaders, and they will be vanquished and "turned on their backs", i. e. banished from and turned out of their country; (2) God will curse them as He had cursed the people who profaned the Sabbath. The words embodying the two prophecies are joined together by the conjunction (or) not to express doubt but to show that either of the two punishments was to befall the Jews; or that some of them were to be 657 their faces on their backs. " This meaning, besides being against Arabic idiom, is entirely uncorroborated by history. If the word is taken in the sense of "faces", then the whole sentence will be taken in a figurative sense, signifying total transformation or ruin. The verse also makes it clear that when speaking of the profaners of the Sabbath as having been turned into apes (2:66; 5:61; 7:164-169), the verses referred to do not mean that they were actually and physically transformed into apes; for, as the present verse shows, the same prophecy was made concerning the Jews who opposed the Holy Prophet and they were never actually transformed into apes.