Sūrah Al-Furqān The Criterion
الفرقان
77 verses, Makkī. The Qurʾān as the Criterion (al-Furqān) separating truth from falsehood. Ibn Kathīr addresses the objections of the polytheists, refutes each one from the Qurʾān, and closes with the magnificent description of the servants of the Most Merciful (ʿIbād al-Raḥmān) twenty qualities across nine verses.
Surah Overview
Key Themes from Ibn Kathīr
Objections refuted (25:7–9): The polytheists said: "What is this messenger he eats food and walks in markets? Why was an angel not sent down with him? Or why was a treasure thrown to him, or he has a garden?" Ibn Kathīr: every prophet sent was human eating, walking, mortal. The miracle is that divinely guided revelation came through this humanity.
ʿIbād al-Raḥmān nine verses of character (25:63–76): They walk humbly on the earth. When the ignorant address them they say peace. They spend the night in prostration and standing. They say: "Our Lord, avert from us the punishment of Hell." They spend neither wastefully nor miserly. They do not invoke another god. They do not commit zinā. They do not kill unjustly. They do not bear false witness. They do not pass by idle speech without dignity. When reminded of Allah's signs they do not fall upon them deaf and blind. Ibn Kathīr: this is the complete portrait of the servant of Allah.
- "Spending neither wastefully nor miserly" (25:67): "Those who, when they spend, do not do so excessively or sparingly but are ever, between that, justly moderate." Ibn Kathīr: the balanced middle path not the ascetic who does not spend nor the extravagant who wastes. A complete economic ethic in one verse.
- The greatest sins and their expiation (25:68–70): The three major sins shirk, murder, zinā. For those who repent and believe and do righteous deeds Allah will replace their evil deeds with good. Ibn Kathīr: this verse motivated many Companions to enter Islam after lives of major sin.
- The two seas (25:53): "It is He who merged the two seas this fresh and sweet, this salty and bitter and He placed between them a barrier and prohibiting partition." The physical phenomenon of haloclines where fresh and salt water meet without mixing.
- Disbelievers in a mirage (25:44): "Or do you think that most of them hear or reason? They are not except like livestock rather, they are even more astray in way." Ibn Kathīr: the human capacity for reason is the greatest gift its abandonment for desire is a descent below the animal.
- "Is it not sufficient that We sent to you a Book which is recited to them?" (25:51): The greatest sign is the Qurʾān itself not miracles of flying carpets or golden mountains. The miracle is the word its eloquence, its guidance, its preservation.