Verse. 1721

١٣ - ٱلرَّعْد

13 - Ar-Ra'd

لَہٗ دَعْوَۃُ الْحَقِّ۝۰ۭ وَالَّذِيْنَ يَدْعُوْنَ مِنْ دُوْنِہٖ لَا يَسْتَجِيْبُوْنَ لَہُمْ بِشَيْءٍ اِلَّا كَبَاسِطِ كَفَّيْہِ اِلَى الْمَاۗءِ لِيَبْلُغَ فَاہُ وَمَا ہُوَ بِبَالِغِہٖ۝۰ۭ وَمَا دُعَاۗءُ الْكٰفِرِيْنَ اِلَّا فِيْ ضَلٰلٍ۝۱۴
Lahu daAAwatu alhaqqi waallatheena yadAAoona min doonihi la yastajeeboona lahum bishayin illa kabasiti kaffayhi ila almai liyablugha fahu wama huwa bibalighihi wama duAAao alkafireena illa fee dalalin

English

Ahmed Ali

To call on Him is true (supplication). For those they invoke other than Him do not answer them at all, except like a man who stretches his hands towards the water that it reach his mouth, but it will never reach it. Not more than error are the prayers of infidels.

14

Tafseer

'Abdullāh Ibn 'Abbās / Muḥammad al-Fīrūzabādī

تفسير : (unto him is the real prayer) the religion of the truth: the confession that there is no god save allah, which is the declaration of one's sincerity to allah. (those unto whom they pray) worship (beside allah respond to them not at all) of benefit when they call upon them, (save as (if the response to) one who stretcheth forth his hands towards water) from far ((asking) that it may come unto his mouth and it will never reach it) in such state, hard as he may try. allah says: just as water cannot possibly reach the mouth of such a man, the idols will also not benefit those who worship them. (the prayer of disbelievers) the worship of the disbelievers (goeth (far) astray) it is void and they will not find it.

Jalāl al-Dīn al-Maḥallī

تفسير : his, exalted be he, is the call of truth, that is, the words that constitute it [the truth], and these are: ‘there is no god but god’ (lā ilāha illā’llāh); and those upon whom they call (read yad‘ūn or tad‘ūn, ‘you call’), [those whom] they worship, apart from him, that is, other than him — namely, the idols — do not answer them anything, of which they ask; save as, is the response to, one who stretches forth his hands towards water, at the edge of a well, calling to it, that it may reach his mouth, by its rising through the well to [reach] him, but it would never reach it, that is, [reach] his mouth, ever: likewise they [the idols] will not answer them; and the call of the disbelievers, their worship of idols — or their actual supplication — goes only astray, [it is only] in perdition.