وَهٰذَا البَلَدِ الأَمينِ
By this secure town.
EXEGESIS
Balad is defined as a confined place which is host to those who live and have congregated in it, i.e. a city or a town. The terms balad and baldah have been used in the Quran fourteen times.
Amīn is an active participial derived from the root word, a-m-n which means having tranquillity, security, and the removal of fear. Therefore, al-amīn is the land which is safe, secure, and tranquil. Al-balad al-amīn is a description of Mecca in the Quran. Āmin is another derivative of the term and is used to describe Masjid al-Ḥarām: In it are manifest signs [and] Abraham’s Station, and whoever enters it shall be secure (āmin) (3:97), and Have they not seen that We have appointed a safe sanctuary (ḥaraman āminan) (29:67).
EXPOSITION
Almost all exegetes agree that this secure town refers to the city of Mecca, because security is one of the main characteristics of the sanctuary of God which is not found anywhere else in the world. And this is the land on which the Kaaba is located.
Some exegetes have mentioned that God has used the word this in the verse to honour and dignify the city of Mecca, highlighting that this location has a special sanctity compared to the locations mentioned in the previous two verses. And it has been referred to with the term amīn, which either denotes a place which has security or a city in which people must be safe and secure and no one is allowed to harm them.
The sanctity of Mecca is such that even in the pre-Islamic era it was known as a secure place such that no one was permitted to transgress the rights of others in it, to the extent that even if a criminal entered this sanctuary they would be safe and immune. In fact, even animals, birds, and trees are safe from all sorts of harm in this particular location.
[1] Raghib, p. 142.
[2] Raghib, p. 90.
[3] Mizan, 20/539.
[4] Mizan, 20/540.
[5] Nemuneh, 27/140.