Surah An-Najm

The theme of the discourse is to warn the disbelievers of Makkah about the error of the attitude that they had adopted towards the Qur’an and the Prophet Muhammad ﷺ. The discourse starts in a way as if to say: “Prophet Muhammad ﷺ is neither deluded nor gone astray, as you are telling others in your propaganda against him, nor has he fabricated this teaching of Islam and its message, as you seem to think he has. In fact, whatever he is presenting is nothing but Revelation which is sent down to him. The belief that he presents before you, are not the product of his own assumptions and speculation but realities of which he himself is an eye witness. He has himself seen the Angel through whom this knowledge is conveyed to him. He has been directly made to observe the great Signs of his Lord: whatever he says is not what he has himself thought out but what he has seen with his own eyes. Therefore, your disputing and wrangling with him is just like the disputing and wrangling of a blind man with a man of sight over a thing which the blind man cannot see but he can see.”

After this, three things have been presented in their successive order: First, the listeners have been made to understand that “the religion that you are following is based on mere conjecture and invented ideas. You have set up a few goddesses like Lat and Manat and Uzza as your deities, whereas they have no share whatever in divinity. You regard the angels as the daughters of God, whereas you regard a daughter as disgraceful for your own selves. You think that these deities of yours can influence God in your favour, whereas the fact is that all the angels together, who are stationed closest to God, cannot influence Him even in their own favour. None of such beliefs that you have adopted, is based on knowledge and reason, but are wishes and desires for the sake of which you have taken some whims as realities. This is a grave error. The right and true religion is that which is in conformity to the reality, and the reality is never subject to the people’s wishes and desires so that whatever they may regard as a reality and truth should become the reality and truth. Speculation and conjecture cannot help to determine as to what is according to the truth and what is not; it is knowledge. When that knowledge is presented before you, you turn away from it, and brand the one who tells you the truth as misguided. The actual cause of your being involved in this error is that you are heedless of the Hereafter. Only this world is your goal. Therefore, you have neither any desire for the knowledge of reality, nor do you bother to see whether the beliefs you hold are according to the truth or not.

Secondly, the people have been told that: God is the Master and Sovereign of the entire Universe. The righteous is he who follows His way, and the misguided he who has turned away from His way. The error of the misguided and the righteousness of the righteous are not hidden from Him. He knows whatever everyone is doing: He will retaliate the evil with evil and the good with good. The final judgment will not depend on what you consider yourself to be, and on tall claims you make of your purity and chastity but on whether you are pious or impious, righteous or unrighteous, in the sight of God. If you refrain from major sins, He in His mercy will overlook your minor errors.”

Thirdly, a few basic principles of the true religion which had been presented hundreds of years before the revelation of the Qur’an in the Books of the Prophets Abraham and Moses have been reiterated so that the people did not remain involved in the misunderstanding that the Prophet Muhammad ﷺhad brought some new and novel religion, but they should know that these are the fundamental truths which the former Prophets of God have always been presenting in their respective ages. Besides, the same Books have been quoted to confirm the historical facts that the destruction of the ‘Aad and the Thamud and of the people of the Prophets Nuh and Lut was not the result of accidental calamities, but God has destroyed them in consequence of the same wickedness and rebellion from which the disbelievers of Makkah were not inclined to refrain and desist in any case. After presenting these themes and discourses the Surah has been concluded, thus: “The Hour of Judgement has approached near at hand, which no one can avert. Before the occurrence of that Hour you are being warned through Muhammad ﷺand the Qur’an in the like manner as the former people had been warned before. Now, is it this warning that you find novel and strange? Which you mock and ridicule? Which you turn away from and cause disorder so that no one else also is able to hear what it is? Don’t you feel like weeping at your folly and ignorance? Abandon this attitude and behaviour, bow down to God and serve Him alone!”

This was that impressive conclusion hearing which even the most hardened deniers of the truth were completely overwhelmed, and when after reciting these verses of Divine word the Messenger of God fell down in prostration, they too could not help falling down in prostration along with him.

Connection between the beginning and the ending of the Surah “By the star when it descends,” (53:1).

“So prostrate to Allah and worship (Him).” (53:62)