وَإِذْ أَخَذْنَا مِيثَاقَ بَنِي إِسْرَائِيلَ لَا تَعْبُدُونَ إِلَّا اللَّهَ وَبِالْوَالِدَيْنِ إِحْسَانًا وَذِي الْقُرْبَىٰ وَالْيَتَامَىٰ وَالْمَسَاكِينِ وَقُولُوا لِلنَّاسِ حُسْنًا وَأَقِيمُوا الصَّلَاةَ وَآتُوا الزَّكَاةَ ثُمَّ تَوَلَّيْتُمْ إِلَّا قَلِيلًا مِّنكُمْ وَأَنتُم مُّعْرِضُونَ
Wa iz akhaznaa meesaaqa banee Israaa'eela laa ta'budoona illal laaha wa bil waalidayni ihsaananw wa zil qurbaa wal yataamaa wal masaakeeni wa qooloo linnaasi husnanw wa aqeemus salaata wa aatuz zakaata summa tawallaytum illaa qaleelan minkum wa antum mu'ridoon
And when we took a covenant from the Children of Israel: worship none but God; be good to parents, to relatives, to orphans, and to the needy; speak kindly to people; establish the prayer and give the alms. Then you turned away, except for a few of you, and you were refusing.
The covenant runs from worship to parents and kin, then to orphans and the needy, then to how people are spoken to, and only at the end to prayer and alms, so most of what it asks governs conduct toward others. Ḥusnan, the word attached to speech, is a noun standing where an adjective would go, so the instruction is to speak good rather than to speak well, and commentators took that difference seriously. The exception at the end preserves a few.