5فَإِذا جاءَ وَعدُ أولاهُما بَعَثنا عَلَيكُم عِبادًا لَنا أُولي بَأسٍ شَديدٍ فَجاسوا خِلالَ الدِّيارِ ۚ وَكانَ وَعدًا مَفعولًاMuhammad AsadHence, when the prediction of the first of those two [periods of iniquity] came true, We sent against you some of Our bondmen of terrible prowess in war, and they wrought havoc throughout the land: and so the prediction was fulfilled.1The term 'ibad, rendered by me above as "bondmen", denotes every kind of "created beings" (in this case, obviously human beings) inasmuch as all of them are, willingly or unwillingly, subservient to God's will (cf. 13:15 and the corresponding note 33). It is probable that the phrase "Our bondmen of terrible prowess in war" relates to the Assyrians who overran Palestine in the seventh century B.C. and caused the disappearance of the greater part of the Hebrew nation (the ten "lost tribes"), and to the Babylonians who, about one hundred years later, destroyed Solomon's Temple and carried off the remainder of the children of Israel into captivity, or to both, thus comprising all these events within one "period" (see foregoing note).- God's "sending" tribulations upon reprobate sinners is here, as elsewhere in the Qur'an, a metonym for the natural law of cause and effect to which, in the long run, the life of man-and particularly the corporate life of nations and communities - is subject.