Al-Inshirāḥ^{1All the MSS bear the title ‘A-lam nashraḥ’, these being the first words of the sūra.}

His words, Exalted is He:

Did We not expand your breast for you?

He said:

‘Did We not dilate your breast for you, with the light of the Message (risāla), and make it a mine for the spiritual realities (maʿdan li’l-ḥaqāʾiq)?’

He [further] said:

The first expansion takes place through the light of Islam, just as He has said, Exalted is He, Whomever God desires to guide, He expands his breast to Islam [6:125].

Then he said:

Then He augments the degrees (manāzil) in addition [to this light], and the lights of [a believer] will be in proportion to the insights he has been granted.

[and did We not] relieve you of the burden?

He said:

This means: ‘We removed from you any acquiescence (sukūn) in other than Us, [that might arise] from the desire (himma) of the natural self, and We have made you peacefully reliant on Us, receiving [all] from Us, through Us.’

His words, Exalted is He:

Did We not exalt your mention?

He said:

‘We linked your name with Our name in the call to prayer (adhān) and the profession of the divine oneness (tawḥīd).^{1The second part of the twofold attestation of faith, after the profession of the divine Unity, ‘I bear witness that there is no god save God (lā ilāha illā’Llāh)’, is the following: ‘I bear witness that Muḥammad is the Messenger of God’. The second part of the twofold attestation of faith (shahādatayn), is likewise recited during the call to prayer (adhān).} Furthermore, a servant’s faith is not accepted until he believes in you.’^{2As well as believing in the other prophets. The Muslim ‘creed’ comprises belief in God, His angels, His messengers, His books and the Resurrection.}

His words, Exalted is He:

So truly with hardship comes ease,

He said:

God, Exalted is He, has magnified the state of hope (rajāʾ) in this verse out of His generosity (karam) and His hidden grace (khafī luṭfihi), and thus He mentions ease twice.^{1For verse 94:6 also states: Truly with hardship comes ease.} Indeed, the Prophet ﷺ said, ‘Hardship (ʿuṣr) will not overwhelm the two eases.’^{2Nīsābūrī, al-Mustadrak, vol. 2, pp. 329 and 575.} By this he meant: the discernment of the heart (fiṭnat al-qalb) and the intellect (ʿaql) are the two ‘eases’ which take control of the natural self, and return it to the state of sincerity (ikhlāṣ). This is [also]the inner meaning of the verse, namely that along with the hardship (shidda) of the natural self (nafs al-ṭabʿ), in its need for God Himself (dhāt al-Ḥaqq), Mighty and Majestic is He, [and] for the spiritual self (nafs al-rūḥ), ⸢[there comes] the ease (suhūla) of the spiritual self ⸣,^{3Added on the basis of MSS: Z515, f. 136a and F638, f. 67a.} the intellect (ʿaql) and the discernment of the heart (fiṭnat al-qalb), and this, in its inner meaning, [signifies] the confident abandonment (taskīn) of the heart of Muḥammad ﷺ to the [divine] succour (iʿāna) in fear. So He [God] said, ‘Truly, We gave ascendancy (sallaṭnā) over your dense natural self, to the subtle [substances] (laṭāʾif) of your spiritual self, intellect, heart and understanding (fahm), all of which pre-existed as a momentous gift (mawhiba jalīla) before the creation appeared by a thousand years, and thus did they subdue the natural self.’^{4See above the commentary on 7:172 regarding the presence of the spiritual self at the Covenant of Alast, from which the natural self was absent. See also IT, p. xl and n. 156.}

So when you are finished, toil,

‘[When you have completed] the prescribed prayer (ṣalāt), and you are seated, toil towards your Lord, and return to Him as you were before [the existence] of the natural self, before the appearance of the creation, alone with the One alone, a secret with a secret.’ Hence, God granted him [Muḥammad] the likeness of his primordial rank in the world, just as the Prophet ﷺ said, ‘Truly, I possess a moment (waqt) with God, during which I cannot attend to other than Him.’^{1See Munāwī, Fayḍ al-qadīr, vol. 4, p. 6.} This is the inner meaning of the verse. Its outer meaning is what is obvious.

Abū ʿAmr b. ʿAlāʾ related the [following story], saying, ‘We fled from al-Ḥajjāj^{2Al-Ḥajjāj b. Yūsuf b. al-Ḥikam al-Thaqafī (d. 95/714).} to the desert, and lived there for a period of time going from neighbourhood to neighbourhood. One morning I was wandering through some neighbourhoods with a distracted mind, clouded heart and feeling downcast, when suddenly I heard an Arab shaykh [who was] passing by recite the following verses: [khafīf metre]

Impose patience upon your soul and every worry will vanish.

For in patience there is a device [to undo every] deceit

Maybe the self detests something in which lies relief,

Like the releasing of the cords binding a camel.

‘The shaykh had not even completed the two couplets before I saw a knight calling out from afar, “Al-Ḥajjāj is dead!”’ He [Abū ʿAmr] continued, ‘Then I asked the shaykh about the word “relief” (farja). He replied, “Furja with a ḍamm on the letter fāʾ is an opening in a wall or in the ʿūd or something similar, whereas farja with a fatḥa on the letter fāʾ is relief after hardship and misfortunes.”’^{3According to Lane, while there may be that distinction, both farja and furja may be used to mean the relief from grief and misfortune.} Abū ʿAmr then said, ‘I did not know which I was happier about, the death of al-Ḥajjāj or the lesson from which I had benefitted.’