European writers have generally associated with the picture of Him as drawn in the Holy Qur’ān. On the contrary, the qualities of love and mercy in God are emphasized in the Holy Qur’ān more than in any other sacred book. Not only does every chapter open with the two names Raḥmān and Raḥīm, thus showing that the qualities of love and mercy are predominant in Divine nature, but the Holy Book goes further and lays the greatest stress in explicit words on the immeasurable vastness of the Divine mercy. The following may be taken as examples:
“He has ordained mercy on Himself’ (6:12, 54). “Your Lord is the Lord of all encompassing mercy” (6:147). “And My mercy encompasses all things” (7:156). “Except those on whom thy Lord has mercy, and for this did He create them” (11:119). “O My servants who have been prodigal regarding their own souls, despair not of the mercy of Allāh, surely Allāh forgives sins altogether” (39:53). “Our Lord! Thou embracest all things in mercy and knowledge.” (40:7).
So great is the Divine mercy that it encompasses believers and unbelievers alike as the above verses show. Even the enemies of the Holy Prophet are spoken of as having mercy shown to them: “And when We make people taste of mercy after an affliction touches them, lo! they devise plans against Our messages” (10:21). The polytheists are repeatedly spoken of as calling upon God in distress, and God as removing their distress. The picture of the Divine attributes portrayed in the Holy Qur’ān is, first and last, a picture of love and mercy, and while these are mentioned under many different names and repeated hundreds of times, His attribute of punishment — Exactor of retribution — occurs but four times in the whole of the Holy Qur’ān.19 It is true that the punishment of evil is a subject on which the Holy Qur’ān is most emphatic, but its purpose in this case is simply to impress upon man that evil is a most hateful thing which ought to be shunned; and, by way of set-off, not only does it lay great stress on the reward of good deeds, but goes further and declares over and over again that evil is either forgiven or punished only with the like of it, but that good is rewarded tenfold, and hundred fold, or even without measure. But at the same time it must be borne in mind that punishment itself, as described in the Holy Qur’ān, is of a