Upon the disbelievers is the curse of 'all the people'

13-3-2015 | IslamWeb

Question:

AslamualakumI dont understand this part of a verse, surah imran verse 87, it says all of mankind curse them. What does this mean. Is it refering to the beielvers, is it talking about an unkown event.

---

Answer:

All perfect praise be to Allaah, The Lord of the Worlds. I testify that there is none worthy of worship except Allaah, and that Muhammad is His slave and Messenger.

 The words of Allaah in Soorah Aal ‘Imraan about the one who disbelieves after having believed (which mean): {Those – their recompense will be that upon them is the curse of Allaah and the angels and the people, all together} [Quran 3:87] is a declaration from Allaah that such people are cursed by Allaah and cursed by the angels and cursed by all people.

The Tafseer scholars interpreted who are the people who curse them in four ways, according to the following:

1. What is meant from this is that on the Day of Judgment the believers will curse them, and the disbelievers will also curse each other; Allaah says (what means): {Then on the Day of Resurrection you will deny one another and curse one another.} [Quran 29:25] Allaah also says about the people of the Fire (what means): {Every time a nation enters, it will curse its sister} [Quran 7:38], and (what means): {…and the witnesses will say, "These are the ones who lied against their Lord." Unquestionably, the curse of Allaah is upon the wrongdoers.} [Quran 11:18] The witnesses are all creatures as interpreted by Qataadah. Therefore, all people will curse the disbelievers.

2. What is meant by "the people" here are the believers, as interpreted by Ibn Mas‘ood, Qataadah and Muqaatil. According to this, it is a general term for which a particular sense is meant, so the meaning is that all the believers will curse them.

3. What is meant is that the majority of people invoke curses on them, and that the cursing of the majority is expressed as the cursing of all the people because the majority is predominant over the minority (i.e. the minority is given the ruling of the majority).

4. All the people, the believers and the disbelievers, in this world curse the wrongdoers, and therefore it applies to every single disbeliever, because each one is a wrongdoer.

Allaah Knows best.