Verses about repentance and forgiveness in the Quran, with the commentaries
The Quran on repentance and seeking forgiveness — "do not despair", sincere repentance, forgiveness and provision, bad deeds turned to good, and when repentance is too late — read in al-Tafsir al-Muyassar, al-Safi and al-Mizan.
Forms of the verb "to ask forgiveness" occur 41 times in the Quran, in 37 verses across 24 surahs, and God is called al-Tawwab, "the One who keeps turning in forgiveness", in eleven verses. This article gathers the main verses by what they say and, at each one, gives the Sunni reading of al-Tafsir al-Muyassar first, then the Shia readings of al-Safi (al-Fayd al-Kashani) and al-Mizan (al-Tabataba'i).
Quotations from the three commentaries are my renderings of the Arabic.
Do not despair
Say, "O My servants who have transgressed against themselves [by sinning], do not despair of the mercy of Allah. Indeed, Allah forgives all sins. Indeed, it is He who is the Forgiving, the Merciful."
Al-Muyassar: do not despair of God's mercy because your sins are many; God forgives all sins, whatever they are, to the one who repents of them and turns back. Al-Safi glosses "who have transgressed against themselves" as who went to excess in wronging themselves by sinning, and relays from Ali: there is no verse in the Quran wider than "O My servants who have transgressed". Al-Mizan: His word is explicit that all sins are forgiven through repentance, even associating others with God; and since such association is forgiven only through repentance, restricting the forgiveness in this verse to repentance cannot be avoided.
So al-Muyassar and al-Mizan agree that the forgiveness here is for the one who repents, and al-Safi relays that it is the widest verse in the Quran. On this verse the three do not differ.
Sincere repentance
O you who have believed, repent to Allah with sincere repentance. Perhaps your Lord will remove from you your misdeeds and admit you into gardens beneath which rivers flow [on] the Day when Allah will not disgrace the Prophet and those who believed with him. Their light will proceed before them and on their right; they will say, "Our Lord, perfect for us our light and forgive us. Indeed, You are over all things competent."
Al-Muyassar: turn from your sins back to obeying God, a turning with no disobedience after it. Al-Safi: nasuh means thorough in sincerity — it describes the one who repents, who is sincere with himself in repenting. It relays from al-Sadiq: the servant repents of the sin and then does not go back to it; and when he was asked, "Which of us has not gone back?", he said God loves, among His servants, the one who is tested and keeps repenting. And in another report: sincere repentance is that a man's inner self be like his outward self, or better. Al-Mizan: sincere repentance is what turns a person away from returning to the sin, or what makes his turning back pure, so that he does not return to what he repented of.
Where they agree
All three agree that sincere repentance is a turning back with no return to the sin after it.
Where they differ
Al-Safi adds two reports: that God loves the servant who falls and repents again and again, and that sincere repentance is the inner self matching the outer. Al-Mizan gives two senses of nasuh: what keeps one from returning, or what makes the turning pure.
Forgiveness and provision
And said, 'Ask forgiveness of your Lord. Indeed, He is ever a Perpetual Forgiver.
He will send [rain from] the sky upon you in [continuing] showers
And give you increase in wealth and children and provide for you gardens and provide for you rivers.
(Nuh 71:10, Nuh 71:11, Nuh 71:12)
Al-Muyassar: ask your Lord to forgive your sins and repent to Him of your unbelief; He forgives those who repent. If you repent and ask forgiveness, God will send you heavy, continuous rain, increase your wealth and children, and give you gardens and rivers. Al-Safi: ask forgiveness of your Lord, by repenting of disobedience; He is ever forgiving to those who repent, and, introduced with "it is said": when his call went on long and they persisted, God withheld rain from them for forty years and made their women barren, so he promised them these things. Al-Mizan relays from Nahj al-Balagha: God has made asking forgiveness a cause for plentiful provision and for mercy on creation, and adds: the reports drawing from these verses that asking forgiveness brings wider provision and children are many.
All three agree that asking forgiveness here means repenting, and that the verses make it a cause of rain, wealth and children. Al-Safi adds, as "it is said", that rain had been withheld for forty years.
Bad deeds turned to good
Except for those who repent, believe and do righteous work. For them Allah will replace their evil deeds with good. And ever is Allah Forgiving and Merciful.
Al-Muyassar: God erases their bad deeds and puts good deeds in their place, because of their repentance and remorse. Al-Safi relays from the Prophet: on the Day of Resurrection God shows Himself to His believing servant and stands him before his sins one by one, then forgives him — no angel near to Him and no prophet sent is let see it, and He covers for him what he would hate anyone to see — then He says to his bad deeds: be good deeds. Al-Mizan sets out the view that God erases their past sins through repentance and sets their later acts of obedience in their place, then says: these readings turn the words from their plain sense without proof; the plain sense is that each bad deed of theirs is itself turned into a good one.
Where they agree
All three agree that the exchange is the reward of repentance, faith and righteous work, and that it comes from God's forgiveness and mercy.
Where they differ
They differ on what the exchange is. Al-Muyassar: the bad deeds are erased and good deeds put in their place. Al-Safi's report: on the Day of Resurrection God tells the bad deeds to become good. Al-Mizan sets aside the erase-and-replace reading and holds that each bad deed itself becomes good.
When repentance is accepted
The repentance accepted by Allah is only for those who do wrong in ignorance [or carelessness] and then repent soon after. It is those to whom Allah will turn in forgiveness, and Allah is ever Knowing and Wise.
But repentance is not [accepted] of those who [continue to] do evil deeds up until, when death comes to one of them, he says, "Indeed, I have repented now," or of those who die while they are disbelievers. For them We have prepared a painful punishment.
Al-Muyassar: God accepts the repentance of those who sin out of ignorance of the consequences — every sinner, by mistake or on purpose, is ignorant in this sense, even if he knows it is forbidden — and then return to their Lord before they see death. Al-Safi glosses "in ignorance" as in folly: committing sin is folly and wilful ignorance, and relays from al-Sadiq: every sin a servant commits, even knowing, he is ignorant when he puts himself at risk by disobeying his Lord. On "soon after" it gives two views — before love of the sin soaks into their hearts and seals them, or before death comes — and al-Kashani adds: the second reading is far from the plain sense of the words. Al-Mizan: "soon" means a near time: before the signs of the hereafter appear and death arrives.
Where they agree
Al-Muyassar and al-Safi agree that every sinner is "ignorant" at the moment of sinning, even knowing it is forbidden. All three agree that repentance is not accepted once death is present, as the next verse says.
Where they differ
They differ on "soon after": before seeing death, for al-Muyassar; before the signs of the hereafter and the arrival of death, for al-Mizan; al-Safi gives both views, finds the second far from the words, and puts first the reading "before love of the sin takes hold of the heart".
What the verses do not say
- They do not set a number of times repentance will be accepted.
- They do not fix one form of words for asking forgiveness.
- They do not name the hour repentance closes, only "when death comes to one of them".
Counted on the mushaf
- Forms of "to ask forgiveness": 41 times in 37 verses across 24 surahs.
- Al-Tawwab / tawwaban describing God: eleven verses.
- "Indeed, Allah loves those who are constantly repentant": once in the whole Quran.
- "Sincere repentance": once.
- "Do not despair": once.
Sources
- al-Tafsir al-Muyassar — King Fahd Complex for the Printing of the Holy Quran.
- Tafsir al-Safi — al-Fayd al-Kashani.
- al-Mizan fi Tafsir al-Quran — al-Sayyid Muhammad Husayn al-Tabataba'i.
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