69وَما عَلَّمناهُ الشِّعرَ وَما يَنبَغي لَهُ ۚ إِن هُوَ إِلّا ذِكرٌ وَقُرآنٌ مُبينٌMuhammad AsadAND [thus it is:] We have not imparted to this [Prophet the gift of] poetry, nor would [poetry] have suited this [message]:1 it is but a reminder and a [divine] discourse, clear in itself and clearly showing the truth,2This passage resumes the theme enunciated in the opening verses of this surah, namely, the revelation of the Qur'an. As in 26:224, we have here an allusion to the allegation of Muhammad's opponents, in his own as well as in later times, that what he described as divine revelation was in reality an outcome of his own poetic invention. This the Qur'an refutes by alluding to the fundamental difference between poetry - especially Arabic poetry - and divine revelation as exemplified by the Qur'an: whereas in the former the meaning is often subordinated to the rhythm and the melody of language, in the Qur'an the exact opposite is the case, inasmuch as here the choice of words, their sound and their position in the sentence - and, hence, its rhythm and melody - are always subordinated to the meaning intended. (Cf. also 26: 225 and the corresponding note 100.)For this composite rendering of the adjective mubin, see surah 12, note 2. Literally, the above phrase reads, "a reminder and a [divine] discourse..., etc., with the conjunctive particle wa ("and") being used here, as in 15:1, to point out that the Qur'an is an integral element in the process of divine revelation.