The Holy Quran with Five Volume Commentary (Vol 5) — Page 510
CH. 95 AT-TĪN 6. Then, if he acts unjustly, We degrade him as the lowest of the low, 4780 7. "Save those who believe and do good works; so for them is an unfailing reward. PT. 30 ثُمَّ رَدَدْنَهُ أَسْفَلَ سَفِلِينَ ) إِلَّا الَّذِينَ آمَنُوا وَعَمِلُوا الصَّلِحَتِ فَلَهُمْ أَجْرٌ غَيْرُ مَمْنُونٍ "11:12; 41:9; 84:26. to one school man is prone to evil, though he has also been endowed with the power to correct and reform himself. This is the Buddhist conception of evil. (ii) According to Christian belief man is by nature sinful, because Adam faltered and committed a sin, and his progeny inherited the taint of sin from their progenitor. (iii) The third school holds the view that man is not born with a good or bad nature. He comes into the world with some natural inclinations and instinctive impulses and it is the sort of education which he gets or the atmosphere in which he moves that make him good or bad. Some mystics hold the view that man is deprived of all freedom of will or action and is completely denied discretion or volition and that he is a helpless victim of predetermined set of conditions and circumstances of which he cannot overcome. (iv) The protagonists of the theory transmigration of souls are of the view that man is born to suffer for the evil deeds he does in a former existence and goes through various forms of rebirth to cleanse himself of his sins. All these views evidently contravene human reason and offend against his moral sense. According to Islam, however, man is born with a pure and unsullied nature, with a natural tendency to do good, but he has also been given a large measure of freedom of will and action to mould himself as he chooses. He has been endowed with great natural powers and qualities to make unlimited moral progress and to rise spiritually so high as to become the mirror in which Divine attributes are reflected. But if he misuses God- given powers and attributes, he sinks lower than even beasts and brutes and becomes the Devil incarnate as the next verse shows. Briefly, the verse signifies that man is blessed with great potentialities for good or evil. 4780. Commentary: If "man" is taken to mean the whole mankind the verse signifies that good precedes evil. This is Islam's main difference with the protagonists of the theory of man's moral evolution, according to whom evil precedes good. If man is taken as an individual the verse means that God has bestowed upon man great natural faculties and powers and has revealed guidance in order that by making right use of them and following Divinely- revealed guidance he might reach the high destiny intended for him. 3406