وَلَا تُفْسِدُوا فِي الْأَرْضِ بَعْدَ إِصْلَاحِهَا
And do not spread corruption on the earth after it has been set right. (al-Aʿrāf 7:56)
The verse genuinely forbids spreading corruption on the earth. It communicates a clear prohibition, rather than a wish or a figurative request.
Lā prohibits and causes jussive inflection. Tufsidū is a second-person plural imperfect verb, one of the “five verb forms”; its jussive marker is the omission of nūn, while wāw marks the subject.
“Fī al-arḍ” names the sphere of action, and “baʿda iṣlāḥihā” supplies the context. Grammar and purpose both identify literal prohibition.