If they had waited for you to come out it would have been better for them. But God is forgiving and kind.
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Tafseer
'Abdullāh Ibn 'Abbās / Muḥammad al-Fīrūzabādī
تفسير : (and if they) the banu 'anbar (had patience till thou camest forth unto them) for the prayer, (it had been better for them) he would have freed all their wives and children; instead he freed half of them and agreed the ransom of the remaining half. (and allah is forgiving) he forgives whoever repents of them, (merciful) in that he did not hasten his punishment on them.
Jalāl al-Dīn al-Maḥallī
تفسير : and had they been patient (annahum, ‘they’, has independent status, on account of inceptiveness; alternatively, it is said to govern an implied verb such as thabata, ‘had [their patience] been maintained’) until you came out to them, it would have been better for them; and god is forgiving, merciful, to those of them who repent.
