Tazkirul Quran, Qur’an 15:61–66
The Rocky Tract (Al-Hijr)
By Maulana Wahiduddin Khan
English text; the translator is not named in the archive’s data.
Translation
(61) When the messengers came to Lot and his family, (62) he said, ‘You are strangers [to me].’ (63) They said, ‘No, but we bring you news about what they disputed, (64) and we have come to you with the truth, and surely we are truthful, (65) so leave with your family some time in the latter part of the night, and walk behind them. Let none of you look back. Go where you are commanded.’ (66) We communicated to him Our decree that the guilty ones would be destroyed by the morning.
Commentary
(a) It was one command with which the angels had gone to Abraham. It was another command with which they reached Lot. The first command was in the shape of a special gift from God and the second one was in the shape of God’s special punishment.
Those angels had come to Lot in the shape of human beings. Their task was to carry into effect God’s verdict upon the prophet’s rejectors. According to the angels’ advice, Lot along with other people of the Faith, left the town in the darkness of the night. Thereafter, in the early morning the whole area was devastated by the explosions of a severe earthquake. All the deniers were summarily killed.
Where did this devastation take place? It took place in this very world which they had considered their own world; in which all appeared to them their comrades and supporters. That very plan which a man considered his key to success becomes an instrument of destruction for him, if God so commands. That very palace of which a man is so proud is turned into a ruin, like a heap of debris descending upon him.