“Then their Lord revealed to them: ‘We will surely destroy the wrongdoers and settle you in the land after them. This is for whoever fears standing before Me and fears My warning.’”

And His saying:

“But whoever fears standing before his Lord will have two gardens.”

Thus He has promised those who fear Him victory in this world and reward in the Hereafter. This can only be because they have fulfilled their obligations, indicating that fear necessarily entails fulfilling one’s obligations. Hence the wicked person is described as someone who does not fear Allah. This meaning is also indicated by His saying, Most High:

“Allah only accepts the repentance of those who do evil in ignorance and then repent soon afterwards.”

Abū al-ʿĀliyah said: “I asked the Companions of Muhammad about this verse, and they told me: ‘Everyone who disobeys Allah is ignorant, and everyone who repents before death has repented soon afterwards.’” The other Quran commentators likewise said this.

Mujāhid said: “Every sinner is ignorant at the time of his sin.” Al-Hasan, Qatādah, ʿAtāʾ, al-Suddī, and others said: “They were called ignorant because of their sins, not because they lacked discernment.”

Al-Zajjāj said: “The verse does not mean that they do not know the act is evil, for if a Muslim committed an act without knowing it was evil, he would be like someone who had committed no evil. Rather, it admits of two meanings:

“(First): They committed it without knowing the harm it entailed.

“Second: They embarked upon it with full awareness and knowledge that its consequences would be harmful, preferring the immediate to the hereafter. They were therefore called ignorant for preferring so little to abundant ease and lasting well-being.”

Al-Zajjāj thus understood ‘ignorance’ to mean either a lack of knowledge of an act’s consequences or a corruption of the will. It may be said that the two necessarily accompany one another. This is discussed at length in the arguments with the Jahmiyyah. The point here is that everyone who disobeys Allah is ignorant, and everyone who fears Him has knowledge