Meaning: It will not settle on its behalf anything it owed to another, because the settling there is by means of good deeds and evil deeds, as we have described. For how could one settle on behalf of another what he owed, when he would be pleased to have a right established for him against his child or father, so that it is taken from him and not pardoned for him?

Some of the grammarians of Basra claimed that the meaning of His statement: {no soul shall settle anything on behalf of another soul} is: no soul shall substitute for it by standing in its place.

This is a view whose corruption is testified to by the apparent text of the Qur'an. That is because it is not intelligible in the speech of the Arabs for a speaker to say, "You did not avail me anything," meaning: "You did not substitute for me by standing in my place." Rather, when they intend to state concerning a thing that it does not substitute for another thing, they say, "This does not substitute for this," and they do not permit saying, "This does not substitute anything for this."

If the interpretation of His statement: {no soul shall settle anything on behalf of another soul} were what was asserted by the one whose opinion we cited, He would have said: {And fear a Day when no soul shall substitute for a soul}, just as it is said, "no soul substitutes for a soul," and He would not have said, "no soul shall settle anything on behalf of another soul." Thus, in the authenticity of the Revelation's wording: "no soul shall settle anything on behalf of another soul," there is the clearest proof of the correctness of what we have said and the corruption of the statement of the one whose view we mentioned in that regard.

The discourse concerning the interpretation of the statement of the Exalted: ﴿nor shall intercession be accepted from it﴾

Abū Jaʿfar said: "Intercession" (al-shafāʿa) is a verbal noun from a man's saying: "So-and-so interceded (shafaʿa) for me to so-and-so with an intercession (shafāʿatan)," which is his requesting him to fulfill his need. A mediator is called a shafīʿ and a shāfiʿ only because he