Others said: Declare the naming of your Lord to be above imperfection by mentioning Him while holding Him in veneration, respecting His remembrance, and obeying His commands. (1) They understood “name” here to mean “naming.”
Ibn Abbas said: “Glorify the Name of your Lord, the Most High” (2) means: pray at the command of your Lord, the Most High.
“Who created and proportioned; who ordained and guided; who brings forth the pasture, then makes it dark, withered stubble.”
“Who created and proportioned”: Al-Kalbi said: He created every living creature, then proportioned its hands, feet, and eyes. Al-Zajjaj said: He created the human being upright; the meaning of “proportioned” is that He made his stature straight.
“Who ordained and guided”: Al-Kisa’i recited it as “ordained,” with the consonant dal ungeminated, whereas the others recited it with gemination; both have the same meaning.
Mujahid said: He guided the human being to the paths of good and evil, happiness and wretchedness, and guided livestock to their pastures.
Muqatil and Al-Kalbi said: He ordained the course of everything, then guided it—that is, He showed it how the male comes to the female.
It was also said: He ordained provisions and guided people to seek their provision and livelihood.
And it was said: He created benefits within things and guided the human being to the means of extracting them from those things.
Al-Suddi said: He ordained the duration of the embryo’s stay in the womb, then guided it to emerge from the womb.
Al-Wasiti said: He decreed happiness and wretchedness for them, then made it easy for each of the two groups to follow the path (3) that He had decreed for it.
“Who brings forth the pasture”: He causes to grow the herbage and that upon which livestock (4) graze, in green, yellow, red, and white varieties.
“Then makes it,” after its greenness, “dark, withered stubble”: dry, decaying vegetation, like the debris seen floating upon floodwater. “Dark” means blackened after having been green, for when pasture dries and withers, it turns black.