And who does greater evil — that is none does more evil — than he who bars God’s places of worship so that His Name be not invoked in them in prayer and praise and strives to ruin them? through destruction and impeding people from them this was revealed to inform of the Byzantines’ destruction of the Holy House sc. Jerusalem or it was revealed when the idolaters barred the Prophet s from entering Mecca in the year of the battle of Hudaybiyya; such men might never enter them save in fear illā khā’ifīna is a predicate also functioning as a command that is to say ‘Frighten them by threats of waging war against them so that not one of them shall enter it feeling secure’; for them in this world is degradation debasement through being killed taken captive and forced to pay the jizya; and in the Hereafter a mighty chastisement namely the Fire.
