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fa-ka-ʾayyin min qaryatin ʾahlaknāhā wa-hiya ẓālimatun fa-hiya khāwiyatun ʿalā ʿurūshihā wa-biʾrin muʿaṭṭalatin wa-qaṣrin mashīdin
How many towns We have destroyed when they had been wrongdoers! So they lie fallen on their trellises, their wells neglected and their ruined palaces!
— Ali Quli Qarai
Surah Al-Hajj – Verse 45
45. “So how many of townships We did destroy while they were unjust, and (their walls) have fallen down over their roofs, and (how many a) well abandoned and (even) lofty castles (ruined).”
Allah’s Wrath upon the unjust and oppressors is not an event, but it is a course. When the punishment of Allah comes forth, there will resist neither any ceilings nor any pillars in the buildings. The Qur’anic word /xawiyah/ is derived from /xawa’/ which means ‘to fall ruin’; and the word /mašid/ means both ‘a lofty castle’ and ‘a stucco-plastered castle’. In the previous verse, the punishment of Allah was referred to in a general manner. Now it has been explained widely in this verse.
It says:
This statement means that the intensity of the event was so serious that at first the roofs fell down and then the walls of the buildings fell down over the roofs. Then, the verse continues implying that there were many good wells with enough water that remained useless and the owners of which were annihilated and their water sank into the earth. Neither their water was pulled out, nor could any thirsty one satiated with it. It says:
And there were also so many splendid castles and very high buildings with beautiful stucco-plaster-ornaments which ruined, and their owners perished. The holy verse, hinting this fact, continues saying:
Thus, both their beautiful and firm residences remained ownerless, and the sources of water which caused their lands to be flourishing, vanished. It is noteworthy that some Islamic traditions, narrated from Ahl-ul-Bayt (as), indicate that the phrase:
has been rendered into the scholars and learned men who have been left alone in the society and no one takes any benefit from their knowledge. Imam Musa-ibn-Ja‘far (as), upon the commentary of the last sentence of the abovementioned verse, said that the ‘well abandoned’, which is not taken benefit from, is the silent Imam; and the ‘lofty castle’ is the ‘rational Imam’. A tradition with the same content has also been narrated from Imam Sadiq (as).20
This commentary, in fact, is a kind of simile, (as Hadrat Mahdi (as), and his worldly justice, has been liked to ‘a flowing water’), and it means that when Imam (as) is settled in the governmental position, he is like a firm high castle that attracts the eyes from near and far distances, and he is a shelter for all. But, when he (as) is kept aloof from the position of government and people go far from around him, in a manner that some evil doers occupy his position, he is like a well full of water which has been left forgotten. Neither the thirsty people enjoy it, nor are the trees, plants and tilths watered by it.
Footnotes