>>767856
>>767861
You see OP, when Allah tells us to do things, He tells us this for a very good reason.
No one has ever been able to comprehend Allah's divine justice. Due to the orginal sin A&E committed, we as humans can't withstand His presence. When Allah revealed Himself to Musa, He could only show him His backside. Allah Himself even said (in Exodus 33)
>“you cannot see my face, for man shall not see me and live.”
So because we cannot see His face one can conclude that when He came down to exterminate Sodom and Gomorrha, Allah was facing His opponent, the wicked cities.
Allah told Lut and family not to look back because if they did, they would be seeing the face of Allah and perish because of His infinite and divine glory. It's kinda like looking directly into the sun. As beautiful as it is, it can be harmful to look at directly. Same goes for Allah, but His presence is infinitely more intense. Our eyes staring at the sun for an extended period of time can damage our eyes. Now imagine the sun being infinitely brighter and intense. Infinitely more radiation being beamed directly into your eyes. You'd go blind near instantly.
>what about other onlookers like Shepards in the distance
We will never know, but one could conclude that they were too far away to fully see what was happening and thus spared the same fate of Lut's wife.
TL;DR
When Allah commands us to do something, He doesn't do it for arbitrary reasons. No one can see the Face of Allah and live to tell about it. That is until He sent down His only Son, Jesus Christ.