Al Shu‘arā’

كَذَّبَتْ قَوْمُ لُوطٍ الْمُرْسَلِينَ

إِذْ قَالَ لَهُمْ أَخُوهُمْ لُوطٌ أَلاَ تَتَّقُونَ

إِنِّي لَكُمْ رَسُولٌ أَمِينٌ

فَاتَّقُوا اللَّهَ وَأَطِيعُونِ

وَمَا أَسْأَلُكُمْ عَلَيْهِ مِنْ أَجْرٍ إِنْ أَجْرِيَ إِلاَّ عَلَى رَبِّ الْعَالَمِينَ

160. “The Lut (people) belied the messengers.”
161. “When their brother Lut said to them: ‘Will you not fear (Allah)?’”
162. “Verily I am unto you a trustworthy, messenger.”
163. “Then be in awe of Allah and obey me.”
164. “And I do not ask you any recompense for it, my recompense is only from the Lord of the worlds.”

The rejection of one Divine prophet is always the same as rejecting all prophets. (Although every nation had its own prophet whom they belied, since all Divine prophets have a single aim and program, belying one of them means belying all of them.) However, the sixth prophet, a part of whose life story and his deviated people is mentioned in this Surah, is Hadrat Lut (as). Although he was living at the same time with Abraham (as), the statement of his life story has not been mentioned next to that of Abraham’s, for the Qur’an is not a history book that explains the events one after another.

It considers the whole aspects of training, education, and improving man which requires some other proportionalities, and here, the life story of Lut and his people is more consistent with the life stories of the prophets who were mentioned recently. At first, it says:

As it was mentioned formerly, too, the application of the Qur’anic word /mursalin/ (messengers), in the plural form, is either for the unity of the call of the prophets, that rejecting one of them is counted as the rejecting all of them; or, in fact, they believed in none of the former prophets, either. Then the Qur’aan points to the call of Lut, which is in line with the quality of the call of other ancient prophets. It says:

The tone of his speech and his deep and extraordinary sympathy shows that he speaks like a brother. Then he added:

Have you seen any treachery from me? It is the same from now on, and I will certainly observe the deposit of Divine revelation and conveying the message of Allah to you. If it is so, be pious, and be in awe of Allah, and obey me because I lead you to happiness and prosperity. The noble verse says:

You may not think that this call is a means for obtaining the worldly wealth and that I pursue a material aim. No, it is not so, and I do not want you to give me the slightest wage. My wage is only to the Lord of the worlds. The verse says: