The Quran

وَيَقولُ الَّذينَ آمَنوا لَولا نُزِّلَت سورَةٌ ۖ فَإِذا أُنزِلَت سورَةٌ مُحكَمَةٌ وَذُكِرَ فيهَا القِتالُ ۙ رَأَيتَ الَّذينَ في قُلوبِهِم مَرَضٌ يَنظُرونَ إِلَيكَ نَظَرَ المَغشِيِّ عَلَيهِ مِنَ المَوتِ ۖ فَأَولىٰ لَهُم

Muhammad Asad

NOW THOSE who have attained to faith say, "Would that a revelation [allowing us to fight] were bestowed from on high!"¹ But now that a revelation clear in and by itself,² mentioning war, has been bestowed from on high, thou canst see those in whose hearts is disease looking at thee, [O Muhammad,] with the look of one who is about to faint for fear of death! And yet, far better for them would be

I am rendering the term surah here and in the next sentence as "a revelation", for whereas there is no surah as such which deals exclusively with questions of war, there are numerous references to it in various surahs; and this is evidently the meaning of this term in the present context as well as in 9::86. There is no doubt that this verse precedes the revelation, in the year 1 H., of 22:39, which states categorically - and for the first time - that the believers are allowed to wage war whenever "war is wrongfully waged" against them (see in this connection note 57 on 22:39).
This is a reference to 22:39-40. For an explanation of the expression muhkamah ("clear in and by itself"), see note 5 on 3:7. (As in the preceding sentence, the term surah has been rendered here, exceptionally, as "revelation".)