Jonah
IN THE NAME OF GOD, THE MOST GRACIOUS, THE DISPENSER OF GRACE
[10:12]
For [thus it is:] when affliction befalls man, he cries out unto Us, whether he be lying on his side or sitting or standing; but as soon as We have freed him of his affliction, he goes on as though he had never invoked Us to save him from the affliction that befell him! Thus do their own doings seem goodly unto those who waste their own selves.


* v.12 : Lit., “called out unto Us against (ilā) an affliction.”
* The expression musrif, which often (e.g., in 5:32 or 7:81) denotes “one who is given to excesses” or “commits excesses” or (as in 6:141) “one who is wasteful,” has in the above context the meaning of “one who wastes his own self” (Rāzī) – namely, destroys his spiritual potential by following only his base impulses and failing to submit to any moral imperative. (Cf. the very similar expression alladhīna khasirū anfusahum occurring in many places and rendered by me as “those who have squandered their own selves.”) In the sense in which it is used here, the term isrāf (lit., “wastefulness” or “lack of moderation in one’s doings”) is almost synonymous with the term tughyān (“overweening arrogance”) occurring in the preceding verse (Manār XI, 314), and relates to the same type of man. The phrase “goodly seem [to them] their own doings” describes the unthinking complacency with which “those who waste their own selves” go through life.