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78. An-Naba The Great News · Makkan
# Ayah/ 40

An-Naba 78:21–26 · Juz 30 · Makkan

Hell Lies in Wait for the Defiant

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The verseALWAYS SHOWN

إِنَّ جَهَنَّمَ كَانَتْ مِرْصَادًا

Indeed, Hell lies in wait,QuranicpediaVerified

لِّلطَّـٰغِينَ مَـَٔابًا

a place of return for those who transgress,QuranicpediaVerified

لَّـٰبِثِينَ فِيهَآ أَحْقَابًا

who will remain in it for ages upon ages,QuranicpediaVerified

لَّا يَذُوقُونَ فِيهَا بَرْدًا وَلَا شَرَابًا

tasting in it neither coolness nor any drink,QuranicpediaVerified

إِلَّا حَمِيمًا وَغَسَّاقًا

only scalding water and a dark, festering fluid —QuranicpediaVerified

جَزَآءً وِفَاقًا

a recompense precisely fitting their deeds.QuranicpediaVerified

In plain languageALWAYS SHOWN

This passage warns that Hell is poised in ambush, the destined return for those who persistently transgress God's limits. They will linger there through long ages, finding no coolness to relieve them and nothing to drink but scalding water and a dark, festering fluid — a recompense exactly fitted to the deeds they committed.

al-Saʿdī

Al-Saʿdī explains that Hell lies in ambush, watching and waiting for the transgressors who denied resurrection and rejected the messengers — it is their final destination and abode. They will dwell there for unending successive ages (aḥqāb), each age followed by another without end, so the term does not imply eventual release but the perpetuity of their stay. They taste no coolness to relieve the fire's heat and no drink to quench their thirst — only scalding water (ḥamīm) and the dark, putrid discharge of the people of Fire (ghassāq). All of this, he stresses, is a recompense that perfectly matches their deeds: as their sins were the gravest, so their punishment is the most severe, in exact and just proportion.

Ibn Kathīr

Ibn Kathīr relates that mirṣād means a place of ambush or observation point from which Hell watches for its inhabitants, and that none of the disbelievers passes over the bridge (ṣirāṭ) without it lying in wait for them. On 'aḥqāb' he cites reports that an age (ḥuqub) is a long span of years, and that the verse conveys perpetuity — for whenever one age ends another begins, forever. He identifies ḥamīm as intensely hot boiling water and ghassāq as the running pus, discharge, and frozen putrid cold of the people of the Fire, and he notes that the punishment being wifāq means it is fully fitting: their disbelief and crimes were enormous, so the requital is correspondingly immense.

al-Ṭabarī

Al-Ṭabarī reports that mirṣād means Hell lies in wait, prepared and watching for the transgressors so that none of them escapes it; some of the early authorities glossed it as a place over which the people must pass. He surveys the views on aḥqāb, noting it denotes successive ages of years, and conveys that the dwellers remain enduringly. He explains 'they taste no coolness nor drink' as the absence of any rest from heat or any quenching drink, then states the exception: what they receive is ḥamīm — boiling water — and ghassāq, which the predecessors described as the foul, putrid fluid that flows from the bodies of the Fire's people. He affirms that jazāʾan wifāqan means a requital corresponding to and agreeing with the deeds they committed.

al-Qurṭubī

Al-Qurṭubī notes the grammatical and lexical senses of mirṣād — a place of ambush — and records the view that Hell watches for the disbelievers as a road waits for travelers. On aḥqāb he gathers the reports estimating the length of a ḥuqub and clarifies that the believers' grave sinners may eventually be removed, while for the disbelievers the ages succeed one another endlessly, so the term does not establish a final limit to their torment. He explains 'no coolness' (bard) as no relief, with some glossing it as no sleep, and 'no drink' as nothing to quench thirst, the only thing given being ḥamīm and ghassāq. He concludes that wifāq means the penalty exactly matches the offense, for there is no sin greater than associating partners with God.

Ayah78:31 — The contrasting destiny in the very same surah: the God-conscious attain triumph and gardens, set directly against the fate of the transgressors here.Ayah38:57 — Ḥamīm and ghassāq named together again as the drink given to the people of the Fire to taste.Ayah10:4 — Recompense tied to disbelief: those who rejected faith receive a drink of scalding water (ḥamīm) and a painful punishment for what they used to deny.

Consider how precisely the passage frames the punishment as "a fitting recompense" — nothing arbitrary, only the measured consequence of a life's choices. What does it mean to live now in a way that one would not fear to meet later?

QuestionWhat does it mean that Hell 'lies in wait' (mirṣād) in Surah An-Naba 78:21?QuestionDoes 'aḥqāb' (ages upon ages) in 78:23 mean the punishment of Hell eventually ends?QuestionWhat are ḥamīm and ghassāq, the only 'drink' given in Hell according to 78:24-25?

MisconceptionEternal punishment in Hell, as described in 78:21-26, is disproportionate and therefore unjust — finite sins committed in a short life cannot justify an infinite penalty.

  1. 1Taysīr al-Karīm al-Raḥmān — ʿAbd al-Raḥmān al-Saʿdī (c. 1950 CE)
  2. 2Tafsīr al-Qurʾān al-ʿAẓīm — Ismāʿīl ibn Kathīr (c. 1370 CE)
  3. 3Jāmiʿ al-bayān — Muḥammad ibn Jarīr al-Ṭabarī (c. 910 CE)
  4. 4al-Jāmiʿ li-aḥkām al-Qurʾān — al-Qurṭubī (c. 1260 CE)
An-Naba 78:21