The Holy Quran with Five Volume Commentary (Vol 3) — Page 594
CH. 17 BANI ISRĀ'ĪL PT. 15 وَمَنْ كَانَ فِي هَذِةٍ أَعْمَى فَهُوَ فِي الْآخِرَةِ But whoso is blind in this. 73 أَعْمَى وَأَضَلُّ سَبِيلًا world will be blind in the Hereafter, and even more astray from the way. 2002 "20:125. on races. Medical science has established the fact that the right hand of man is comparatively stronger than the left. Various explanations for this phenomenon have been offered by scientists, some of which are based on psycho-physics and others social habits. At any rate among normal men the percentage of left- handed persons has been found to vary from 4 to 8, while among the mentally defective the percentage is much higher (Enc. Brit. , 14th Edition, under Handedness). It may well be concluded from these facts that the right hand is better suited for the performance of work than the left. So it is quite reasonable to regard the right arm as the symbol of strength. The receiving by believers of the records of works in their right hands may therefore be understood to point to the fact that they were industrious, diligent and self-sacrificing, while the receiving by disbelievers of their records in their left hands would signify that they were slow, lazy and selfish, the left hand being symbolic weakness. of Moreover, the right hand 1S reserved for doing works which are generally regarded as clean while the left hand is reserved for unclean works. Thus the holding by believers of their records in their right hands would signify that their works were good and pure and the works of disbelievers were unclean and dirty as they would hold their records in their left hands. According to some commentators of the Quran the word (right hand) also signifies strength and power (69:46). According to this sense of the word the holding by believers of their records in their right hands would signify that they had taken hold of virtue with strength and resolution while the holding by disbelievers of their records in their left hands would signify that they did not strive after virtue with requisite strength and zeal. The word (right hand) also means a blessed thing as in the ḥadīth i. e. both the hands of my كلتا يدى ربى يمين Lord are full of blessings. (Biḥār, vol. 2, p. 503). In this sense the words, "whoso shall be given his book in his right hand" would symbolize that the believers' record would be a blessed one. 1802 The words, such will read their book, only point to a common habit of man. The possessor of a good record naturally reads it again and again while he whose record is bad conceals it and avoids reading it. See also v. 15 above. For the word whit) see 4:50. 2002. Commentary: (a The verse means to say that those