with their own eyes. This is why Allah Most High says of them, “So they will not return”—to it. For they departed from Islam after having adopted it and received its light, and so they will not return to it. Of the disbelievers, Allah Most High says, “So they do not understand,” because they neither understood Islam nor entered it nor received its light. Rather, they remain in the darkness of disbelief, deaf, mute, and blind.
Glory be to Him who made His words a cure for the ailments of hearts, a call to faith and its realities, an invitation to everlasting life and abiding bliss, and a guide to the path of righteousness. The herald of faith would surely have made himself heard, had he found attentive ears; and the Quran’s admonitions would have brought healing, had they encountered hearts free of distraction. But the winds of doubts and desires swept over these hearts and extinguished their lamps. The hands of heedlessness and ignorance gained mastery over them, shutting the doors to their guidance and losing their keys. Their own deeds covered them in rust, so words no longer benefited them. Intoxicated with wayward desires and specious falsehoods, they no longer heeded reproach.
They were admonished with exhortations more piercing than spearheads and arrows, but they had died in the sea of ignorance and heedlessness, held captive by whims and desires.
A wound brings no pain to the dead.
As for deafness and impaired hearing, these occur in His words, exalted is He:
“Deaf, mute, and blind.”
And His words:
47:23 “Those are the ones Allah has cursed, making them deaf and blinding their eyes.”
And His words:
7:179 “We have certainly created for Hell many of the jinn and mankind. They have hearts with which they do not understand, eyes with which they do not see, and ears with which they do not hear. They are like livestock—rather, they are even further astray. It is they who are heedless.”
And His words, exalted is He:
41:44 “As for those who do not believe, there is deafness in their ears, and it is blindness to them. They are being called from a distant place.”
Ibn ‘Abbās said: “Their ears are deaf to hearing the Quran, and it is blindness to them. Allah has blinded their hearts, so they do not understand. They are called from a distant place, like an animal that understands nothing but calls and cries.”
Mujāhid said: “Far from their hearts.” Al-Farrā’ said: “You say to a man who does not