Marmaduke Pickthall, The Meaning of The Glorious Koran. An Explanatory Translation (1930)

SÛRAH V

Al Mâ’idah, “The Table Spread,” derives its name from vv. 112 ff., where it is told how the disciples of Jesus asked that a table spread with food might be sent down from Heaven, and their prayer was granted, a passage in which some have seen an allusion to the Eucharist. Many authorities regard it as the last Sûrah in order of revelation, and Rodwell has so placed it in his chronological arrangement; but the claim can only be established in the case of verse 3, which announces the completion of their religion for the Muslims, and the choice for them of Al-Islâm (the Surrender to Allah) as their religion. That verse is undoubtedly the latest of the whole Koran. It was revealed during the Prophet’s last pilgrimage (“The Farewell Pilgrimage,” as it is called) to Mecca, and spoken by him in the course of his address to the assembled thousands at ‘Arafât, when all Arabia had embraced Al-Islâm, only a little while before his death. It is possible that, as Nöldeke supposes, two other verses near to it are of the same date, but the remainder of the revelations contained in this Sûrah belong rather to the period between the fourth and seventh years of the Hijrah. Its subject is observance of religious duties. The followers of former prophets had failed through breaking their covenant, and so the Muslims are adjured to keep their covenant with God and all their obligations watchfully, because God’s covenant is only with those who do right. There is more mention of the Christians here than in the former Sûrahs, from which some writers infer that this Sûrah must have been revealed at the time when the Prophet was at war with certain Christian tribes belonging to the Eastern Roman Empire. But there is no evidence for that either in Tradition or in the text itself.

The period of revelation is between the fifth and tenth years of the Hijrah.