any discourse, nor has He mentioned in the Quran any verse indicating the time of the Hour. We know that Allah has reserved knowledge of certain things for Himself and has not disclosed them to His servants. The dispute concerns only speech that He has sent down, described as guidance, clarification, and healing, and commanded people to reflect upon. Yet it is then claimed that some of it has a meaning known only to Allah, although neither Allah nor His Messenger has identified that portion whose meaning no one knows. Consequently, anyone who turns away from verses whose meaning he does not believe in classifies them as ambiguous passages on the strength of his own assertion alone.

Moreover, the occasion of this verse’s revelation was the episode involving the people of Najrān. They had argued from His words “Indeed, We” and “We,” and from His description of Jesus as “a word” from Him and “a spirit” from Him. Muslims agree that the meaning of these expressions is known. How, then, can it be said that neither the angels, nor the prophets, nor any of the early generations knows the meaning of the ambiguous passages? These are part of Allah’s speech, which He sent down to us and commanded us to reflect upon and understand, describing it as clarification, guidance, healing, and light. The sole purpose of speech is to convey its meanings; were meaning not intended, it would not be permissible to utter words devoid of meaning.

Al-Hasan said:

“Allah has not sent down any verse without loving that people should know what it was revealed about and what was meant by it.”

As for the claim that the occasion of this verse’s revelation was the Jews’ inquiry about the letters in “Alif Lām Mīm,” according to their numerical values, this is a false report.

First, because it is transmitted through al-Kalbī.