Explanation of (the text), And thou wilt surely know them in the perversion of their speech.

God said to the Prophet in the course (of the Qur’án), “One sign of the hypocritical is easier (to perceive than other signs):

Though the hypocrite be big, handsome, and terrible, thou wilt recognise him in his perverse enunciation and speech.”

When you are buying earthenware pots, you make a trial, O purchaser.

You give the pot a tap with your hand: why? In order that you may know the cracked one by the sound (which it makes).

The voice of the cracked one is different; the voice is a cháwúsh (beadle): it goes in front of it (the pot).

The voice comes in order to make it known: it determines (the character of) it, as the verb (determines the form of) the masdar (verbal noun).

When the subject of (Divine) probation cropped up, the story of Hárút at once came into my memory.