“And Allah sends down rain from the sky, giving life thereby to the earth after its death. Indeed, in that is a sign for a people who listen. (65) And indeed, for you in livestock there is a lesson: We give you drink from what is in their bellies—between excretion and blood—pure milk, pleasant for those who drink it. (66)”

“By Allah, We certainly sent messengers to nations before you,” just as We sent messengers to this community. “Then Satan made their evil deeds seem fair to them. So he is their patron today,” their supporter and companion. He is called their patron because they obey him. “And theirs will be a painful punishment” in the Hereafter.

“We have not sent down to you the Book except that you may make clear to them that over which they differed,” concerning religion and legal rulings, “and as guidance and mercy for a people who believe.” That is, We sent down to you the Book only as clarification, guidance, and mercy. Thus, “guidance and mercy” are coordinated with His words, “that you may make clear.”

“And Allah sends down rain from the sky,” meaning rain, “giving life thereby to the earth” through vegetation, “after its death,” that is, its dryness. “Indeed, in that is a sign for a people who listen”: they listen with the hearing of their hearts, not merely the hearing of their ears.

“And indeed, for you in livestock there is a lesson,” an admonition. “We give you drink”: Nafiʿ, Ibn ʿAmir, Abu Bakr, and Yaʿqub recited it here and in Surah al-Mu’minun with a fatḥah on the nun, while the rest recited it with a dammah; both are valid dialectal forms.

“From what is in their bellies”: Al-Farraʾ said that the pronoun refers back to naʿam (livestock), and naʿam and anʿam mean the same. The term naʿam is grammatically masculine. Abu ʿUbaydah and Al-Akhfash said that naʿam may be treated as either masculine or feminine; those who treat it as feminine do so because of its collective sense,