La tuharrik bihi lisanaka litaAAjala bih (surah Qiyamah: 16)

Tafseer Tafheem-ul-Quran by Syed Abu-al-A'la Maududi

(75:16) (O Prophet), *11 do not stir your tongue hastily (to commit the Revelation to memory).

Laa tuharrik bihee lisaa naka lita`jala bih

*11) The whole passage from here to "Again, it is for Us to explain its meaning", is a parenthesis, which has been interposed here as an address to the Holy Prophet (upon whom be peace). As we have explained in the Introduction above, in the initial stage of the Prophethood when the Holy Prophet (upon whom be peace) was not yet fully used to receiving the Revelation, he was afraid when Revelation came down to him whether he would be able to remember exactly what the Angel Gabriel (peace be on him) was reciting to him or not. Therefore, he would try to commit to memory rapidly what he heard from the Angel simultaneously. The same thing happened when Gabriel was reciting these verses of Surah AI-Qiyamah. Therefore, interrupting what was being revealed, the holy Prophet was instructed to the effect: "Do not try to memorise the words of the revelation, but listen to it attentively and carefully. It is Our responsibility to enable you to remember it by heart and then to recite it accurately. Rest assured that you will not forget even a word of this Revelation, nor ever commit a mistake in reciting it!
After this instruction the original theme is resumed with "No, by no means! The fact is . . . " The people who are not aware of this background regard these sentences as wholly .unconnected with the context when they see them interposed here. But one does not see any irrelevance when one has understood their background. This can be understood by an example. A teacher seeing the inattentiveness of a student in the course of the lesson might interrupt the lesson to tell him, "Listen to me carefully", and then resume his speech, This sentence will certainly seem to be irrelevant to those who might be unaware of the incident and might read the lesson when it is printed and published word for word, But the one who is aware of the incident because of which this sentence was interposed, will feel satisfied that the lesson has been reproduced verbatum and nothing has been increased or decreased in it in the process of reproduction.
The explanation that we have given above of the interpolation of the parenthesis in the present context, is not merely based .on conjecture, but it has been explained likewise in the authentic traditions. Imam Ahmad, Bukhari, Muslim, Nasa'i, Tirmidhi Ibn Jarir, Tabarani, Baihaqi and other traditionists have related with authentic chains of transmitters a tradition from Hadrat `Abdullah bin `Abbas, saying that when the Qur'an was revealed to the Holy Prophet (upon whom be peace), he would start repeating the words of the Revelation rapidly as the Angel Gabriel recited them, fearing lest he should forget some part of it later. Thereupon, he was instructed: "Do not move your tongue to remember this Revelation hastily ... The same thing has been related from Sha`bi, Ibn Zaid, Dahhak, Hasan Basri, Qatadah, Mujahid and other early commentators.