mutual disowning: we would disown them as they disowned us
فَنَتَبَرَّأَ مِنْهُمْ كَمَا تَبَرَّءُوا۟
fa-natabarraʾa minhum kamā tabarrawʾū — then we would disown ourselves from them just as they disowned themselves from us
In (2:167) the single root ب ر ا in verb form V is used twice within a single verse, with the action passing in both directions between the two parties: the followers wish to disown the ones they followed, as those followed disowned the followers.
The verse reports the speech of "those who followed" (2:167). They express a wish — "If only there were for us a return" — and the wished-for action is built on the root ب ر ا in form V: فَنَتَبَرَّأَ مِنْهُمْ, a first-person plural subjunctive, "we would disown ourselves from them." The comparison is then anchored in the same root and form applied to the other party: كَمَا تَبَرَّءُوا۟ مِنَّا, "just as they disowned themselves from us." The structure is a mirror: the same action, in the same form V, is projected from one party onto the other, with the attached pronouns reversed (from-them / from-us). The wished-for disowning is thus defined as the exact counterpart of a disowning already carried out by the other side. The verse frames this mirrored exchange as something God shows the speakers: "Thus does Allah show them their deeds as regrets upon them" (2:167), so the mutual disowning belongs to a scene of retrospect and regret, and the verse adds that they are "not ones to come out of the Fire" (2:167). The mirror construction makes the action named symmetrical between the two parties: each side's disowning is measured against the other's, with the parties reversed — though one disowning is only wished for while the other has already been carried out.
Where it occurs
- 2:167 Both uses of the root sit in one verse: the followers' wished-for disowning of those they followed, set by كَمَا against those followed ones' disowning of the followers.
All Qur'anic expressions