لِيُنذِرَ مَن كانَ حَيًّا وَيَحِقَّ القَولُ عَلَى الكافِرينَ

So that anyone who is alive may be warned, and that the word may come due against the faithless.

EXEGESIS

Yaḥiqqa (may come due) is the imperfect form of ḥaqqa, which was discussed under verse 7: The word has certainly become due against most of them, so they will not have faith. Ḥaqqa signifies that the consequences of their traits have become inevitable, and the application of justice is unavoidable. In other words, the execution of punishment is incumbent and inescapable. However, it only becomes incumbent (yaḥiqqu) after the warning is given and after the living hearts are saved.

Al-qawl (the word) signifies the primordial decree of God about those who go to hell along with Satan when He told him, Begone! Whoever of them follows you, indeed the hell shall be your requital, an ample recompense (17:63).

EXPOSITION

The purpose of the revelation of the Quran is to remind and warn. However, it only warns those whose hearts are alive and reflective, those who hear the truth and pay heed to the warnings.^{‎[1]Mizan, 17/117.} At the same time, it confirms the inevitability of the punishment on those who do not pay heed to the warning and whose hearts are dead. It echoes what was mentioned at the beginning of this surah: The word has certainly become due against most of them, so they will not have faith (verse 7).^{‎[2]Mizan, 17/109.}

The Quran regards those whose hearts are not impacted by admonition as dead. Indeed, you cannot make the dead hear, nor can you make the deaf hear the call when they turn their backs [upon you] (27:80). A living heart and soul would accept the word of God and His warnings, but those who deny and reject God and His warnings have dead hearts even if they live. The verse implies that apart from natural life and death, humans have a spiritual life and death too. Life can be classified into different levels. The first is the vegetative life, which is the life making growth, nutrition, and reproduction possible. The second is animal life, which makes meaningful movement, emotions, and feelings possible. The third is human life, which makes possible higher concepts, reflection, learning, receptiveness to admonition and advice, and spiritual connection possible. Each level contains the qualities of the lower level too. So, a human being would have life in all three levels of vegetative, animal, and human life. The Quran regards the most important aspect of human life to be reflection, spiritual connection, and receptiveness to admonition. That is why you see in this verse that Allah says that the Quran can only warn those alive, meaning only those who have human life.

There are other expressions that the Quran uses to allude to those who are living naturally but dead spiritually. They have senses that are not functioning, they have eyes yet they are blind from seeing the truth; they have ears yet they are deaf, and they have tongues yet they are dumb from speaking the truth or asking about it. The parable of the faithless is that of someone who shouts after that which does not hear [anything] except a call and cry: [they are] deaf, dumb, and blind, they do not apply reason (2:171).

Another expression related to this in the Quran is the hearts with a disease, such as the hearts of the hypocrites; God further increases the disease because of their beguilement. There is a sickness in their hearts; then Allah increased their sickness, and there is a painful punishment for them because of the lies they used to tell (2:10).

INSIGHTS FROM HADITH

1. Imam Ali (a) said: ‘Learn the Quran for it is the best of discourses, and understand it thoroughly for it is the blossoming of the hearts. Seek cure with its light for it is the cure for the hearts. Recite it beautifully for it is the most beneficial of chronicles.’^{‎[3]Nahj, sermon 110.}
2. Imam Ali (a) describes the righteous: ‘[Those who] put their ears to that knowledge which is beneficial to them … You will see … their hearts humble … [such a person] accepts the truth before it is testified [to him]. He does not misappropriate what is placed in his custody nor forget what he is reminded … he does not enter into falsehood and does not leave the truth.’^{‎[4]Nahj, sermon 193.}
3. Imam Ali (a) described those with him whose hearts were dead and no warning would affect them: ‘They never seek illumination from the lights of wisdom, nor did they strike the trigger of piercing knowledge. In this matter they are like the grazing cattle and hard rocks … Why am I seeing you as bodies without souls and souls without bodies, worshippers without reform, traders without profits, wakeful but sleeping, present but unseen, looking but blind, hearing but deaf, and speaking but voiceless?’^{‎[5]Nahj, sermon 108.}

REVIEW OF TAFSĪR LITERATURE

There are two probabilities about the warner who warns those who are alive. It is either the Holy Prophet or the Quran. The probability that considers the Holy Prophet to be the warner is connected with verse 69, which indicates that God did not teach him poetry. This probability is more suitable considering the context. The second probability is that the Quran is the warner, which warns the hearts that are alive, and this probability flows with the word Quran at the end of the previous verse.^{‎[6]Razi, 26/105.}

INSIGHTS FROM OTHER TRADITIONS

1. I will cleanse you from all your impurities and from all your idols. I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you; I will remove from you your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh. And I will put my spirit in you and move you to follow my decrees and be careful to keep my laws.^{‎[7]Ezekiel 36:25-27.}
2. But because of your stubbornness and your unrepentant heart, you are storing up wrath against yourself for the day of God’s wrath, when his righteous judgment will be revealed. God “will repay each person according to what they have done.” … There will be trouble and distress for every human being who does evil: first for the Jew, then for the Gentile; but glory, honour and peace for everyone who does good: first for the Jew, then for the Gentile. For God does not show favouritism.^{‎[8]Romans 2:5-11.}
3. Truly, the righteous attain life, but whoever pursues evil finds death. The Lord detests those whose hearts are perverse, but he delights in those whose ways are blameless. Be sure of this: The wicked will not go unpunished, but those who are righteous will go free.^{‎[9]Proverbs 11:17-21.}

[1] Mizan, 17/117.
[2] Mizan, 17/109.
[3] Nahj, sermon 110.
[4] Nahj, sermon 193.
[5] Nahj, sermon 108.
[6] Razi, 26/105.
[7] Ezekiel 36:25-27.
[8] Romans 2:5-11.
[9] Proverbs 11:17-21.