(Revealed before Hijrah)
The Surah was revealed at Mecca. It is difficult to assign it a definite date. Some scholars place it in the Middle Meccan Period; some others like Rodwell and Noldeke give it a later date. The preceding several Chapters embodied prophecies about the rise, progress and the ultimate victory of Islam over other Faiths, while in the immediately preceding Chapter, Al-Ahzab, the subject was dealt with at some length; how the combined forces of darkness utterly failed in their nefarious designs to destroy Islam and how Islam emerged from one of the severest ordeals with flying colours; its power and prestige having been considerably enhanced. In the present Surah, however, Muslims have been warned that they should be on their guard against falling into bad ways because when wealth and prosperity come to a people, they are prone to give themselves up to a life of ease and luxury. Since God has no particular relation with any community for all time, if Muslims in the heyday of their glory and material prosperity led a life of sin—as did the Sabaeans or the Israelites after Solomon—they too would suffer the same fate.
The Surah opens with the celebration of the praises of Allah 'to Whom belongs whatever is in the heavens and whatever is in the earth,' implying that as God is Great and Almighty a people who seek to defy His authority are sure to meet with failure and frustration. It proceeds to say that disbelievers delude themselves into the belief that their rejection of the Message of Islam will go unpunished and that 'the Hour will never come upon them.' They are warned that their power will break and their glory depart and that this fact will constitute a proof of the truth of the Holy Prophet’s mission. Next, the Surah makes a somewhat detailed reference to Prophets David and Solomon, who made vast conquests and subdued rebellious tribes, and in whose reigns, the Israelite power and glory rose to its zenith. But in the pride of their power and prosperity the Israelites fell into evil ways and began to lead a life of sin. This reference to the Israelites is followed by a reference to the Sabaeans who were a highly prosperous and cultured people, but who like the Israelites defied and disobeyed Divine commandments and like them incurred the displeasure of God and were destroyed by a mighty flood. By referring to the might, glory and prosperity of the Israelites under David and Solomon, and to that of the Sabaeans, and to the subsequent destruction of both, the Surah gives a warning to Muslims that wealth, power and prosperity will also be bestowed on them, but if in the heyday of their glory they, like the Israelites and the Sabaeans, gave themselves up to a life of luxury and ease, they will be punished like them. Next, the Surah deals with its main theme, viz. the progressive rise of the cause of Islam and the sad fate that is in store for idol-worshippers and their false deities. The disbelievers are challenged to call upon their deities to obstruct the progress of Islam, and to arrest the decline and downfall of their own false ideals and institutions. They are told that no power on earth could stop this from happening. In order to make them realize that their cause was destined to perish and Islam to sweep away everything before it, they are further told to study the operation of the laws of nature, which were all working in its favour. In answer to the disbelievers’ demand as to when the prophecy about the rise and progress of Islam will be fulfilled, the Surah goes so far as to fix a definite date for it. Its signs, it says, will begin to appear about a year after the Flight of the Holy Prophet from Mecca when the Quraishites, by expelling him from his native town, will render themselves deserving of Divine punishment. After this the Surah observes that whenever a Divine Reformer makes his appearance it is the vested interests and privileged classes that stand in his way. They feel and apprehend that the rise of the new Movement will weaken their hold on the poor people who, by accepting the new Message, will refuse to be exploited or suppressed any more. So they fight it tooth and nail and try to nip it in the bud and the suppressed and exploited classes are, by threats and intimidation, dragooned into accepting their lead and opposing the Divine Reformer. Towards its close the Surah refers to a simple criterion by which it could be easily found out that the Holy Prophet is neither an impostor nor a maniac but a true Prophet of God. An impostor, it says, is never allowed to prosper and eventually comes to a sad end but the cause of the Prophet is progressing, and a madman cannot bring about such a wonderful revolution in the life of a whole people as the Holy Prophet has done.