The Verse of Tabligh (Al-Ma'idah 67): how Sunni and Shia scholars read it
Al-Ma'idah 67 and its setting, then how each school reads it, drawn from the commentaries this site serves - al-Muyassar, al-Safi and al-Mizan - with the points of agreement set out before the points of difference.
The verse
O Messenger, announce that which has been revealed to you from your Lord, and if you do not, then you have not conveyed His message. And Allah will protect you from the people. Indeed, Allah does not guide the disbelieving people.
It is known as the Verse of Tabligh — of conveying, or announcing. Two questions carry the discussion: what is "that which has been revealed to you from your Lord" that the Prophet is being told to announce? And what accounts for the warning that follows it, and for the promise of protection?
This article sets out each school's reading in the words of a commentary this site serves, rather than describing anyone's position for them, and it does not adjudicate between them. The Arabic commentaries are rendered into English here by me; the full originals are on the verse's own page, linked at the end.
The setting
The verse stands between two verses about the People of the Scripture. Before it:
And if only they upheld [the law of] the Torah, the Gospel, and what has been revealed to them from their Lord, they would have consumed [provision] from above them and from beneath their feet. Among them are a moderate community, but many of them - evil is that which they do.
After it:
Say, "O People of the Scripture, you are [standing] on nothing until you uphold [the law of] the Torah, the Gospel, and what has been revealed to you from your Lord." And that which has been revealed to you from your Lord will surely increase many of them in transgression and disbelief. So do not grieve over the disbelieving people.
That placement — a verse about conveying, set between two verses about the People of the Scripture — is itself one of the things the disagreement turns on.
The Sunni reading
Al-Tafsir al-Muyassar, published by the King Fahd Complex, reads it this way: O Messenger, convey the revelation of God that has been sent down to you from your Lord; if you fall short in conveying it and keep any of it back, then you have not conveyed your Lord's message. And — al-Muyassar adds — he did convey his Lord's message in full, so whoever claims that he kept back anything revealed to him has invented a grave falsehood against God and His Messenger. God is your protector and will give you victory over your enemies, so nothing is upon you but the conveying. God does not guide to right conduct anyone who turns from the path of truth and denies what you have brought from Him.
So al-Muyassar takes "that which has been revealed to you" as the revelation at large, without identifying one particular ruling, and reads the end of the verse as a guarantee of protection: the delivering is all that is asked of him.
The Shia reading
Al-Fayd al-Kashani, in Tafsir al-Safi, takes the thing commanded to be announced as the wilayah of Ali, and reads the warning accordingly: if you abandon conveying what was revealed to you concerning the wilayah of Ali and conceal it, you would be as though you had conveyed nothing at all of the messages, as far as deserving punishment goes.
He then gives the report, and notes that it is narrated outside Shia transmission as well: God commanded His Prophet to designate Ali to the people and to inform them of his wilayah; the Prophet feared they would say he was favouring his cousin, and that it would weigh on some of his companions, so this verse was revealed — and he took Ali by the hand on the day of Ghadir Khumm and said, "whoever's mawla I am, Ali is his mawla." Al-Safi attributes that account to Ibn Abbas and Jabir ibn Abd Allah, and observes that it is also recorded by al-Tha'labi, al-Haskani and others outside the Shia tradition.
Al-Allamah al-Tabataba'i, in Tafsir al-Mizan, builds his case on the wording and the placement before the reports. He first argues that the verse does not belong with what surrounds it: there is no room for doubt, he writes, that the verse does not share the context of the verses before and after it, and is not connected to them in their sequence — it is a single verse revealed on its own.
His evidence for that is the end of the verse. "And Allah will protect you from the people" shows that the ruling being conveyed is a weighty matter carrying a danger to the Prophet himself or to the religion; and, he argues, neither the Jews nor the Christians of that time posed a danger that could justify withholding or delaying the conveying, still less one that would need a divine promise of protection.
He argues second that reading "that which has been revealed to you" as the religion in its entirety empties the sentence: it would come to "O Messenger, convey the religion, and if you do not convey the religion then you have not conveyed the religion."
He then concludes that this supports what the reports from both schools transmit: that the verse was revealed concerning the wilayah of Ali, that the Prophet feared being accused over his cousin and delayed conveying it from one time to another until the verse came down, and that he conveyed it at Ghadir Khumm, saying there: whoever's mawla I am, this Ali is his mawla.
Where the two agree
- That the verse addresses the Prophet with a command to convey what was revealed to him, that it carries a warning against failing to, and that it carries a promise of protection from the people.
- That the Prophet conveyed what he was commanded and concealed nothing. Al-Muyassar says so explicitly and rejects any claim to the contrary; al-Mizan holds that he conveyed the ruling in question.
- That the report of Ghadir Khumm is transmitted in both traditions. Al-Safi itself says so, naming Ibn Abbas and Jabir and pointing to non-Shia recorders of it; al-Mizan says the texts come through the routes of both schools.
- That the close of the verse denies guidance to those who deny what the Prophet brought.
Where they differ
- On what "that which has been revealed to you" is. Al-Muyassar takes it as the revelation at large, with no particular ruling specified; al-Safi and al-Mizan identify it as the matter of the wilayah.
- On what the placement means. Al-Mizan holds the verse to be a single revelation standing apart from its neighbours, arguing from the promise of protection and from the redundancy he says the other reading produces; al-Muyassar does not take up the question of separating the verse from its context at all.
- On how the reading is established. Al-Safi rests his on transmitted report; al-Mizan rests his on the wording and the placement and then supports it with report; al-Muyassar confines itself to explaining the words.
- On what follows from the report. This is the largest disagreement between the two schools — what the Ghadir report entails as to meaning. This page is not the place to settle it.
These positions are set out as their own books state them. Weighing them is not the business of this page.
Sources
- Al-Tafsir al-Muyassar — a panel of scholars of tafsir, King Fahd Complex for the Printing of the Holy Quran.
- Tafsir al-Safi — al-Fayd al-Kashani.
- Tafsir al-Mizan — Sayyid Muhammad Husayn al-Tabataba'i.
All three in full, each attributed to its author, on the verse's own page:
Tafsir of the Verse of Tabligh
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