Those who, when they wrong themselves, remember Allah and seek forgiveness for their sins - and who forgives sins except Allah?
“Those who, when they wrong themselves, remember Allah and seek forgiveness for their sins - and who forgives sins except Allah?”
They are the ones; if they were to commit a major sin, or wrong themselves by committing a lesser sin, they remember Allah, and His warning to the wrongdoers and promise to the Mindful; so they ask their Lord for forgiveness, regretting what they did.
The plain meaning, from Al-Mukhtasar fi at-Tafsir
وَٱلَّذِينَ إِذَا فَعَلُوا۟ فَٰحِشَةً أَوْ ظَلَمُوٓا۟ أَنفُسَهُمْ ذَكَرُوا۟ ٱللَّهَ فَٱسْتَغْفَرُوا۟ لِذُنُوبِهِمْ وَمَن يَغْفِرُ ٱلذُّنُوبَ إِلَّا ٱللَّهُ وَلَمْ يُصِرُّوا۟ عَلَىٰ مَا فَعَلُوا۟ وَهُمْ يَعْلَمُونَ
And those who, when they commit an immorality or wrong themselves by transgression, remember Allah and seek forgiveness for their sins - and who can forgive sins except Allah? - and who do not persist in what they have done while they know.
What does Quran 3:135 mean?
This is part of a description of the people promised the garden as wide as the heavens and the earth — and what is being described is not that they do not sin. It is what they do next. The commentators point out the two things it names: they remember Allah at that moment rather than later, and they do not knowingly persist in what they did.
Written from Al-Mukhtasar fi at-Tafsir