joined means breaking off family relations and severing the bonds between the hearts of believers. You can make further examples. And [sundering what is joined by creational commands] means cutting off actions from knowledge, and separating knowledge from intelligence, severing intelligence from innate abilities, and knowledge of Allah from reason, and labour from strength, and jihad from courage, and so on. For the giving of strength is a non-material creational command (amr ma‘nawī takwīnī ) to work, and the giving of intelligence is non-material creational command to learn. And so on.
The phrase “and spread corruption on earth (wa yufsidūna fī al-arḍ):”
Consider this: in accordance with [the saying] “the more general the calamities the pleasanter they become,” a person who becomes depraved and gets embroiled in the morass wants companions who are similarly embroiled so as to alleviate his terrible plight. Likewise, if [the idea of] revolution settles in someone’s heart, it will lead to the ruin of its perfections and attainments and its high sentiments will gradually decline, and the desire to destroy will born in it. This will make him feel a pleasure at destruction, and he will seek the pleasure by spreading corruption and fomenting revolution.
• If you were to ask: How can the whole earth, indicated by the word “on earth,” be affected by the corruption of one depraved person?
You would be told: That which has order has balance; in fact, the order is based on balance. If even an insignificant thing disturbs the workings of a machine, the machine is affected by it. And a pair of scales holding two mountains in its pans is affected if only a walnut is placed on one of them.
Now the phrase “these it is that shall be the losers (ūlā’ika humu al-khāsirūn):”
Consider this: this phrase should have been: “they are the losers since [they did not accept] right-guidance through [the Qur’an].” [It is expressed the way it is to make the following points, concerning:] “these (lit. those) (ūlā’ika),” and “they (hum),” and the definite article of “the losers,” and its generality:
The purpose of “these (lit. those) (ūlā’ika)” is to conjure up the idea of something palpable or perceptible (li-iḥḍār al-maḥsūs) and this indicates that when the listener hears of their vile situation, it arouses his disgust and makes him angry at them. So he wants to picture them in his imagination in order to vent his anger and express his loathing, and to observe them as their terrible end is described.