اصْبِرْ عَلَىٰ مَا يَقُولُونَ وَاذْكُرْ عَبْدَنَا دَاوُودَ ذَا الْأَيْدِ ۖ إِنَّهُ أَوَّابٌ (17)
(38:17) (O Prophet), bear with patience what they say, *16 and call to mind Our servant David, *17 who was endowed with great strength *18 and who constantly turned (to Allah).
*16) The allusion is to the absurd conversation of the disbelievers of Makkah, as narrated above, to the effect that the Holy Prophet was a sorcerer and a liar, and to their objection whether he was the only fit person in the sight of Allah to be appointed as a Messenger, and to their some accusation that he had vested interest in preaching the doctrine of Tauhid to the people and not any religious mission.
*17) Another translation of this sentence can be: `Remember Our servant David." According to the first translation, it would mean: "There is a lesson in this story for these people," and according to the second: "The remembrance of this story will help you too, to have patience. " As the narrative is meant to serve both purposes, comprehensive words have been used as contain both meanings. (For the story of the prophet David, see AI-Baqarah :251, Bani Isra'il: 55, AIAnbiya': 78-81, An-Naml: 15 and the E.N.'s thereof; and E.N.'s 14 to 16 of Saba).
*18) The words in the original are: dhal-ayd (possessor of the hands). The word "hand" is used metaphorically for strength and power not only in Arabic but in other languages also. When as an attribute of the Prophet David it is said that he was a "possessor of the hands", it will necessarily mean that he possessed great powers. These powers may mean the physical strength which he displayed during his combat against Goliath, military and political power by which he crushed the neighbouring idolatrous nations and established a strong Islamic empire, moral strength by which he ruled like a poor king and always feared Allah and observed the bounds set by Him, and the power of worship by virtue of which, besides his occupations in connection with rule and government and fighting in the cause of Allah, he fasted every alternate day and spent a third of the night in worship according to a tradition of Bukhari. Imam Bukhari in his History has related, on the authority of Hadrat Abu ad-Darda', that whenever the Prophet David was mentioned, the Holy Prophet used to say: "He was the greatest worshipper of God. "