meaning, “Lend me your ear and give me your undivided attention, so that you may grasp my words and understand me”—because it was an expression of abuse among the Jews. They would use it privately to insult the Prophet, may Allah bless him and grant him peace. When they heard it from his Companions, they rejoiced and seized the opportunity to address him with it openly, thereby openly insulting him without facing any consequences. Allah therefore informed His Prophet and the believers of this and forbade the expression, lest it provide the Jews with a means of insulting the Prophet, may Allah bless him and grant him peace. Other interpretations of the verse have been offered, but this is the most evident explanation.
Allah, blessed and exalted be He, says:
“You certainly knew those among you who transgressed concerning the Sabbath. We said to them, ‘Be apes, despised!’” [Al-Baqara: 65]
He also says:
“Ask them about the town by the sea, when its people transgressed concerning the Sabbath: their fish would come to them openly on their Sabbath day, but would not come on days when they did not observe the Sabbath. Thus We tested them because of their disobedience.” [Al-A‘rāf: 163]
These verses demonstrate the obligation to prohibit means leading to forbidden ends as follows: Allah forbade the Jews to fish on the Sabbath as a test for them. When Moses instructed them to observe Friday and told them of its merit, they said, “How can you instruct us to observe Friday and give it precedence over the other days, when the Sabbath is the best of all days? Allah Most High created the heavens, the earth, and time in six days, and on the Sabbath everything rested in obedience to Him.”
Allah, Almighty and Majestic, then said to Moses, “Leave them to what they have chosen. They must not catch fish or anything else on that day, nor do any work on it.”
The fish would come to them on the Sabbath, appearing openly, as Allah Most High has said. On all other days, they would disappear from their sight, and they could reach them only through the toil of fishing. They therefore blocked the fishes’ passages on the Sabbath and caught them on the other days, saying, “We do not engage on the Sabbath in the fishing that we have been forbidden to do; we do it only on other days.”
Allah punished them for doing this—by transforming them into apes and swine, as He has related in His Book—because it was a means to the fishing they had been forbidden, even though it was not itself fishing in the strict sense. Allah’s Messenger, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, said: