God had made a covenant with the Children of Israel for what will be mentioned shortly and We raised up there is a shift of address away from the third to the first person from among them twelve leaders from each tribe one leader to be responsible for his people’s fulfilment of the covenant as a way of binding them to it. And God said to them ‘I am with you helping and assisting. Surely if la-in the lām is for oaths you establish the prayer and pay the alms and believe in My messengers and succour them help them and lend to God a goodly loan by expending in His way I will absolve you of your evil deeds and I will admit you to gardens underneath which rivers flow. So whoever of you disbelieves after that covenant surely he has strayed from the right way’ he has erred from the path to Paradise al-sawā’ originally means ‘the middle way’. And they broke the covenant.
