(5–6) “Rather, they say, ‘These are confused dreams! No, he has fabricated it! No, he is a poet! Let him then bring us a sign like those given to the former peoples.’ * No town that We destroyed before them ever believed. Will these people, then, believe?”
Allah Most High mentions the contradictory fabrications of those who deny Muhammad—may Allah bless him and grant him peace—and the magnificent Quran that he brought. They treated him as a fool (1) and made various false claims about it. At times they say, “Confused dreams,” like the words of a delirious sleeper who is unaware of what he is saying. At other times they say, “He has fabricated it,” inventing it and falsely attributing it to Allah from his own mind. Yet at other times they say that he is a poet and that what he brought is poetry.
Anyone with even the slightest knowledge of the Messenger’s actual circumstances who examines what he brought will conclude with absolute certainty that it is the noblest and most sublime of all speech, that it is from Allah, and that no human being is capable of producing anything comparable even to a portion of it. Allah challenged His enemies to produce something to rival it, despite their abundant motives for doing so and their hostility toward it, yet they were incapable of presenting any rival to it—and they knew this. Otherwise, what was it that so agitated them, robbed them of sleep, and left their tongues faltering, if not the truth, before which nothing can stand?
They make these claims about it—since they do not believe in it—only to drive away those who do not ⦗519⦘ know it. Yet it is the greatest abiding sign demonstrating the truth of what the Messenger—may Allah bless him and grant him peace—brought and proving his truthfulness. It is fully sufficient and decisive. Whoever seeks some other proof or demands a sign besides it is ignorant and unjust, resembling those obstinate people who denied him and demanded signs of their own choosing—something that would prove most harmful to them and bring them no benefit. If (2) their aim is to recognize the truth once its evidence becomes clear, its evidence has already become clear without such signs. But if their aim is to set an impossible challenge and make an excuse for themselves should he fail to bring what they demand, then in this state they would certainly not believe even if the signs they demanded were brought to them. Even if every sign came to them, they would not believe until they saw the painful punishment.
Allah therefore relates their demand: “Let him then bring us a sign like those given to the former peoples”—that is, such as the she-camel of Sālih, the staff of Moses, and similar signs.
Allah says, “No town that We destroyed before them ever believed”—that is, after receiving such demanded signs. His established way is that when people demand such a sign and it is granted to them, yet they still refuse to believe, He swiftly punishes them. The former peoples did not believe in those signs, so will these people believe in them? What advantage do they possess over those earlier peoples? What goodness within them would lead them to believe when such signs appeared? This question conveys a negation: they will never do so.