OCCASION OF REVELATION (VERSE NO. 212)

      IBN - ABBASS, the famous commentator has narrated that: ``the verse came down to answer a group of aristocrats and chiefs who had formed a minority class in Mecca. They lived in affluent surroundings, and in the luxurious houses. On the contrary, the believers were generally poor and worked hard for their sustenance.'' The aristocrats scoffed at the believers and said to them: ``If Mohammad was a man of eminent personality, and was a distinguished man of God, as he claims, all the lord, and chiefs of the tribes would have been his followers instead of these poor and indigent people who have now adhered to him.'' So the verse came down to this effect to render futile such childish ideas and reasonings.

COMMENTS

      The said cause of the revelation prevents us not to draw a general and common rule of the verse, and taking it as a complementary to the preceding verse. It signifies that the mortal life of this world is adorned and made alluring in the sight of the unbelievers, and those men of rank and wealth who reject faith. They have been blind drank by vanity and arrogance, and therefore they ridicule the believers who might probably be poor and needy. They know not that God in His wisdom and plan, may give more to those who seem to deserve it the least; and this temporary favour does not mean that the favoured is dearer and nearer to God. The account is not taken down here. It will be taken in the Last Day of Doom. There; in the life to come the spiritual ranks and positions will take shape and form and are personified. The believers will live a high class of life, and will have the most comfortable positions; on contrary to the heathens who may be men of rank and wealth, and social position here, but the losers there who live in the worst of the abodes. Therefore God in HIS wisdom and for His general plan may give of His bounty here, to whomsoever He pleases. These are glad-tidings for the believers, and warnings for the unbelievers.