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8
وَلَئِن أَخَّرنا عَنهُمُ العَذابَ إِلىٰ أُمَّةٍ مَعدودَةٍ لَيَقولُنَّ ما يَحبِسُهُ ۗ أَلا يَومَ يَأتيهِم لَيسَ مَصروفًا عَنهُم وَحاقَ بِهِم ما كانوا بِهِ يَستَهزِئونَ

Muhammad Asad

And thus it is: if We defer their suffering until a time-limit set [by Us],1 they are sure to say, "What is preventing it [from coming now]?"2 Oh, verily, on the Day when it befalls them there will be nothing to avert it from them; and they shall be overwhelmed by the very thing which they were wont to deride.3
  • Lit., "a time computed [by Us]", i.e., the Day of Judgment: a reference to the last sentence of verse 3 above, where the Prophet is made to say, "I dread for you the suffering [which is bound to befall you] on that awesome Day!" Among the several meanings which the noun ummah comprises, that of "time" or "a period of time" is the most appropriate here (Zamakhshari, Ibn Kathir and other classical commentators).
  • For an explanation of this allusion to the attitude of the unbelievers, see 8:32 and 10:50, as well as the corresponding notes; cf. also 6:57-58. The repeated Qur'anic references to the above derisive query are evidently meant to show that the attitude of mind responsible for it is not restricted to an isolated historic incident (see Sarah 8, note 32) but is symptomatic of most, if not all, people "who are bent on denying the truth".
  • Lit., "that which they were wont to deride enfolded them (haqa bihim)". According to almost all the commentators, the use of the past tense in the verb haqa, despite the fact that it refers to the future, has the syntactic value of a stress, implying the inevitability of the happening to which it relates. (See also note 9 on 6:10.)