Surah Fatir, Ayah 38

هُوَ الَّذِى جَعَلَكُمْ خَلَـئِفَ فِى الاٌّرْضِ

(He it is Who has made you successors generations after generations in the earth,) meaning, all people succeed one another, generation after generation. This is like the Ayah:

وَيَجْعَلُكُمْ حُلَفَآءَ الاٌّرْضِ

(and makes you inheritors of the earth, generations after generations) (27:62).

فَمَن كَفَرَ فَعَلَيْهِ كُفْرُهُ

(so whosoever disbelieves, on him will be his disbelief.) means, he and no one else will have to bear the consequences of that.

وَلاَ يَزِيدُ الْكَـفِرِينَ كُفْرُهُمْ عِندَ رَبِّهِمْ إِلاَّ مَقْتاً

(And the disbelief of the disbelievers adds nothing but hatred of their Lord.) means, the longer they persist in their disbelief, the more Allah hates them, and the longer they persist in it, the more they and their families will lose on the Day of Resurrection. This is in contrast to the believers, for the longer they live and do good deeds, the higher their status in Paradise will be, the greater their reward, and the more beloved they will be to their Creator.

When the people in Jahannam will plead with their Lord that they be delivered from its punishment, so that they could do good deeds then, and not do the bad ones they did earlier, at that time they will be told: أَوَلَمْ نُعَمِّرْ‌كُم مَّا يَتَذَكَّرُ‌ فِيهِ مَن تَذَكَّرَ‌ وَجَاءَكُمُ النَّذِيرُ‌ "Did We not give you an age in your life in which lesson could have been learnt by the one who wished to take lesson - 37) Sayyidna Ibn Husain Zain ul-` Abidin رضی اللہ تعالیٰ عنہ said, "It means the age of seventeen years." And Qatadah (رح) gave the age as eighteen years, meaning thereby the age of puberty. And the difference of seventeen and eighteen is possible in determining the age of puberty, as someone may reach puberty at the age of seventeen and someone else at, eighteen. In the Shari'ah, the age of puberty is the first line of demarcation after having crossed which a person is Divinely blessed with enough reason, so that one can understand what is good or bad in his or her case. Therefore, this address will be to disbelievers at large irrespective of their ages being long or short. However, the one who had a long lease of life, yet did not come to his senses, saw all sorts of physical proofs scattered around and heard the teachings of the prophets, still did not recognize the truth - so then, this one will be more blameworthy.

Those who deny the Truth in this world will admit the Truth in the Hereafter. But this will be of no avail, because in the Hereafter, such an admission will be made under compulsion, whereas God seeks voluntary submission from man. It is the denial and obstinacy of such wrongdoers which will make them incur the eternal wrath of God.