An-Najm states that 'no bearer of burdens will bear the burden of another,' and that man will have nothing except what he has striven for, and that his striving will be seen (53:38-40), verses classical theology cites as a foundational statement of individual moral accountability, read alongside the very similar declaration in Fatir as one of two clear Quranic anchors for the doctrine that guilt, merit and effort are not transferable between persons regardless of kinship, lineage or relationship to a righteous ancestor.
Commentators read the verse as addressing, among other things, pre-Islamic Arabian and other ancient beliefs in inherited merit through ancestry, insisting instead that a person's own effort, not descent from a righteous or notable forebear, determines their standing. The verse is cited in later Islamic theological writing when distinguishing Islamic teaching on personal responsibility from doctrines elsewhere that emphasise inherited guilt or vicarious atonement through another's action, a comparison this passage's classical commentators draw explicitly, framing the distinction as a considered theological position rather than an incidental difference of emphasis. The same principle is cited in modern Islamic writing against claims of guaranteed salvation through birth, community membership or association alone, independent of a person's own conduct.