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THE HUNDRED-SIXTH SŪRAH Quraysh Mecca Period

ACCORDING to some of the Companions of the Prophet and several learned men of the next generation, this sūrah and the preceding one form, in fact, one entity. Thus, in the Qur’ān-copy owned by Ubayy ibn Ka`b, Al-Fīl and Quraysh were written as one sūrah, i.e., without the customary invocation “In the name of God” intervening between them (Baghawī and Zamakhsharī). We must remember that side by side with Zayd ibn Thābit and `Alī ibn Abī Ṭālib, Ubayy ibn Ka`b was one of the foremost authorities on whom both Abū Bakr and `Uthmān relied for the final recension of the text of the Qur’ān; and it is probably for this reason that Ibn Ḥajar al-`Asqalānī regards the evidence of Ubayy’s Qur’ān-copy as fairly conclusive (Fatḥ al-Bārī VIII, 593). Moreover, it is established that, when leading the congregational prayer, `Umar ibn al KhaṬṬāb used to recite the two sūrahs as one (Zamakhsharī and Rāzī). But whether Al-Fīl and Quraysh are one sūrah or two separate ones, there is hardly any doubt that the latter is a continuation of the former, implying that God destroyed the Army of the Elephant “so that the Quraysh might remain secure” (see verse 1 below and the corresponding note).

1

بِسمِ اللَّهِ الرَّحمـٰنِ الرَّحيمِ لِإيلافِ قُرَيشٍ

SO THAT the Quraysh might remain secure,1

  1. 1.  Lit., "for the safeguarding of the Quraysh", i.e., as the custodians of the Kabah and the tribe in the midst of which the Last Prophet, Muhammad, was to appear. Thus, the "security of the Quraysh" is a metonym for the security of the Kabah, the focal point of the Faith based on the concept of God's oneness, for the sake of which the army of Abrahah was destroyed (see introductory note as well as preceding surah).
2

إيلافِهِم رِحلَةَ الشِّتاءِ وَالصَّيفِ

secure in their winter and summer journeys,2

  1. 2.  I.e., the two annual trade caravans - to the Yemen in winter and to Syria in summer - on which the prosperity of Mecca depended.
3

فَليَعبُدوا رَبَّ هـٰذَا البَيتِ

Let them, therefore, worship the Sustainer of this Temple;3

  1. 3.  I.e., the Kabah (see note 102 on 2:125).
4

الَّذي أَطعَمَهُم مِن جوعٍ وَآمَنَهُم مِن خَوفٍ

who has given them food against hunger, and made them safe from danger.4

  1. 4.  Cf. Abraham's prayer, "O my Sustainer! Make this a land secure, and grant its people fruitful sustenance" (2:126).
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