I.e., the Last Hour (see note [1] on 101:1. For particulars of the pre-Islamic tribes of 'Ad and Thamud, see {7:65-79} and the corresponding notes.

I.e., Sodom and Gomorrah, the cities of Lot's people see {11:69-83}.

Alluding to the punishment of evildoers and the saving grace bestowed upon the righteous.

The term as-sama' may denote here "the sky" or "skies", i.e., the visible firmament, or "heaven" in its allegorical sense, or the aggregate of cosmic systems comprised in the concept of "the universe" (cf. surah {2},note [20]).Its being "rent asunder" is perhaps a metaphor for a total breakdown of the cosmic order.

Since God is infinite in space as well as in time, it is obvious that His "throne" ('arsh) has a purely metaphorical connotation, circumscribing His absolute, unfathomable sway over all that exists or possibly could exist (cf. note [43] on 7:54). Hence, too, the "bearing aloft" of the throne of His almightiness cannot be anything but a metaphor - namely, an allusion to the full manifestation of that almightiness on the Day of Judgment. The Qur'an is silent as to who or what the "eight" are on whom this manifestation rests. Some of the earliest commentators assume that they are eight angels; others, that they are eight ranks of angels; while still others frankly admit that it is impossible to say whether "eight" or "eight thousand" are meant (Al-Hasan al-Basri, as quoted by Zamakhshari). Possibly, we have here an allusion to eight (unspecified) attributes of God or aspects of His creation; but, as the Qur'an states elsewhere, "none save God knows its final meaning" (see 3:7 and the corresponding note [8]).

Implying that he had always been conscious of resurrection and judgment, and had tried to behave accordingly.

The term sultan, which primarily signifies "power" or "authority", has here - as in many other places in the Qur'an - evidently the meaning of "argument", synonymous with hujjah (Ibn 'Abbas, 'Ikrimah, Mujahid, Ad-Dahhak, all of them quoted by Tabari): in this case, an argument or arguments against the idea of life after death and, hence, of divine judgment.

See 14:49 - "on that Day thou wilt see all who were lost in sin (al-mujrimin) linked together in fetters" - and the corresponding note [64], which explains my above interpolation of the phrase, "of other sinners like him".

Lit., "did not urge", i.e., himself.

The phrase "all that you can see" comprises all the observable phenomena of nature - including man himself and the organic conditions of his own existence - as well as the configuration of human society and the perceptible rules of its growth and decay in the historical sense; whereas "that which you cannot see" relates to the intangible spiritual verities accessible to man's intuition and instinct, including the voice of his own conscience: all of which "bears witness", as it were, to the fact that the light which the divine writ (spoken of in the sequence) casts on the innermost realities and interrelations of all that exists objectively - or, as the case may be, manifests itself subjectively in man's own psyche - must be an outcome of genuine revelation, inasmuch as it goes far beyond anything that unaided human intellect could ever acheive.