At-TīnThe Fig

Ibn ʿAbbās and others held that the fig and olive refer to well-known lands associated with these fruits, often linked to the region of Prophet ʿĪsā عليه السلام; al-Ṭūr Sīnīn is the mountain where Allah spoke to Mūsā عليه السلام; 'this secure city' is Makkah, from which Muḥammad ﷺ was sent.

— Ibn Kathīr, Tafsīr al-Qurʾān al-ʿAẓīm

Al-Qurṭubī records differing views on whether al-tīn and al-zaytūn name the actual fruits, sacred mountains bearing them, or lands where prophets were sent, without settling on one meaning as certain.

— Al-Qurṭubī, al-Jāmiʿ li-Aḥkām al-Qurʾān

Al-Ṭabarī favours reading the four oaths as marking four sites tied to four prophetic missions in sequence, building toward the address to the Prophet ﷺ that follows.

— Al-Ṭabarī, Jāmiʿ al-Bayān

Aḥsan taqwīm refers to the finest proportion and form: an upright stature, sound limbs, and faculties of reason and understanding granted to no other creature in this combination.

— Ibn Kathīr, Tafsīr al-Qurʾān al-ʿAẓīm

Al-Qurṭubī notes that some early exegetes read taqwīm as including moral and intellectual capacity, not merely bodily shape — the human being alone was given the disposition to know and worship.

— Al-Qurṭubī, al-Jāmiʿ li-Aḥkām al-Qurʾān

'The lowest of the low' (asfala sāfilīn) is explained by most exegetes as the weakness and decrepitude of old age, or, by others, as the lowest depths of the Hellfire for those who reject faith — the exception in āyah 6 shows the second sense fits the argument better: only disbelief and evil deeds bring that lowest fall.

— Ibn Kathīr, Tafsīr al-Qurʾān al-ʿAẓīm

Al-Ṭabarī transmits both views — old age, or the Fire — but notes the exception for believers who do righteous deeds only coheres fully with the reading that the fall in question is moral and eschatological, not merely physical ageing.

— Al-Ṭabarī, Jāmiʿ al-Bayān

Having established creation in the best form and the real difference belief and deeds make, denying recompense afterward becomes unreasonable; the closing question calls the reasoning mind to affirm what it should already accept.

— Ibn Kathīr, Tafsīr al-Qurʾān al-ʿAẓīm

It is reported that reciting this closing āyah invites the response 'Balā, wa-anā ʿalā dhālika min al-shāhidīn' ('Yes indeed, and I am among those who testify to it') — a practice attributed to some early reciters, though not as an obligatory ruling upon every reciter.

— Al-Qurṭubī, al-Jāmiʿ li-Aḥkām al-Qurʾān