If you manage to escape it, you will have escaped a grave calamity; but if not, I do not imagine you will ever be saved.
Ibn al-Qayyim—speaking in Zad al-Maʿad while discussing the events of the Battle of Uhud—is the one who said this, and his words are cited here to clarify the meaning of the noble verse.
That “assumption” referred to in Allah’s words, “they entertained about Allah an assumption that was not true” (Āl ʿImrān 3:154), has been explained as follows:
• “It will vanish”: that is, it will fade away until not a trace of it remains; the Arabic term idhmaḥlāl means complete disappearance.
• The assumption itself has been interpreted in three ways:
- A denial of divine wisdom—namely, the notion that what Allah decreed at Uhud served no higher purpose, even though He Himself said, “so that Allah might test what is in your breasts and purge what is in your hearts; Allah is All-Knowing of what lies within hearts” (Āl ʿImrān 3:154).
- A denial of predestination: their claim that, had the Muslims listened to them and not gone forth, they would not have been killed.
- A denial that Allah would complete His Messenger’s cause: they imagined, when the idolaters briefly prevailed, that this was the decisive end and that Islam and its people had perished.
The same evil presumption is mentioned regarding the hypocrites and idolaters in Surah al-Fath: “those who presume about Allah an evil presumption” (al-Fath 48:6).
“To give falsehood the upper hand” means to grant it dominance and victory.
“Out of obstinate opposition to predestination” means objecting to and finding fault with Allah’s decree.
“Some more, some less” indicates that people vary in the degree to which they voice such objections to the divine decree.