“So leave Me to deal with those who deny this discourse. We shall draw them on step by step from where they do not know. And I will grant them respite; indeed, My plan is firm. Or do you ask them for payment, so that they are burdened by debt? Or do they possess knowledge of the unseen, so that they write it down? So be patient for your Lord’s decree, and do not be like the companion of the fish, when he called out while choked with grief. Had a favour from his Lord not reached him, he would have been cast upon the barren shore while blameworthy. But his Lord chose him and made him one of the righteous.” (44–50)

“So leave Me to deal with those who deny this discourse”: that is, leave Me to deal with those who deny the Quran, and leave Me alone with them. Al-Zajjaj said: “Its meaning is: Do not occupy your heart with them; leave them [all] (1) to Me, for I will [deal with them for you] (2).” [He said: Similarly, “Leave Me with the one whom I created alone.” In the language, this means: Do not occupy your heart with him; leave him to Me, for I shall requite him. Likewise is a man’s saying, “Leave me with him.” It does not mean that he has forbidden him from dealing with the man; rather, its intended meaning is: Leave him to Me, for I will take care of his affair for you.] (3)

His saying, Exalted is He, “We shall draw them on step by step”: We shall seize them with punishment “from where they do not know.” Thus, they were punished on the Day of Badr. “And I will grant them respite; indeed, My plan is firm. Or do you ask them for payment, so that they are burdened by debt? Or do they possess knowledge of the unseen, so that they write it down? So be patient for your Lord’s decree”: Be patient with their harm in submission to your Lord’s decree. “And do not be,” in impatience and haste, “like the companion of the fish,” who was Jonah son of Amittai, “when he called out” to his Lord [in] (4) the belly of the fish, “while choked with grief,” that is, filled with sorrow.

“Had a favour from his Lord not reached him”: that is, had mercy from his Lord not reached him, when He showed him mercy and accepted his repentance, “he would have been cast upon the barren shore”: he would have been thrown out from the belly of the fish onto the open land, “while blameworthy”: reproached and censured for the sin [he had committed] (5).

“But his Lord chose him”: that is, He selected him, “and made him one of the righteous.”

“And indeed, those who disbelieve would almost strike you down with their eyes when they hear the Reminder, and they say, ‘Indeed, he is surely mad.’ Yet it is nothing but a reminder to all peoples.” (51–52)

“And indeed, those who disbelieve would almost strike you down with their eyes”: This was because the disbelievers wished to afflict the Messenger of Allah, peace and blessings be upon him, with the evil eye. A group from Quraysh looked at him and said, “We have never seen anyone like him, nor anyone with arguments like his.”

It was also said that the ability to cast the evil eye was found among Banu Asad, to the extent that a fat she-camel or cow would pass by one of them, and he would look at it and then say, “Girl, take the basket and some silver coins, and bring us some of the meat of this animal.” Before she could even leave, the animal would collapse