The Quran

Preface

وَأُحيطَ بِثَمَرِهِ فَأَصبَحَ يُقَلِّبُ كَفَّيهِ عَلىٰ ما أَنفَقَ فيها وَهِيَ خاوِيَةٌ عَلىٰ عُروشِها وَيَقولُ يا لَيتَني لَم أُشرِك بِرَبّي أَحَدًا

Yusuf Ali

So his fruits (and enjoyment) were encompassed (with ruin), and he remained twisting and turning his hands over what he had spent¹ on his property, which had (now) tumbled to pieces to its very foundations, and he could only say, “Woe is me! Would I had never ascribed partners to my Lord and Cherisher!”²

“Fruits”, “spent”, “twisting of the hands”, should all be understood in a wide metaphorical sense, as well as the literal sense. He had great income and satisfaction, which were all gone. What resources he had lavished on his property! His thoughts had been engrossed on it; his hopes had been built on it; it had become the absorbing passion of his life, if he had only looked to God, instead of to the ephemeral goods of this world!
In this case, in his mind, there was his own Self and his Mammon as rivals to God!