Understanding ‘Deen’

words, presenting the establishment of a state or a system as the primary mission of prophethood, and claiming that the prophets began their work from the very first day with this objective, is incorrect. The entire substance of our criticism of the book under discussion can be summed up as follows: matters that enter religion from different angles after faith has been accepted have been presented in this book as the core mission of prophethood itself. Regarding this, our position is that such a claim is not established by any verse of the Quran. The first two verses are from chapter 3 and are meant to show that, until the Day of Judgment, the only religion acceptable to Allah and a way to salvation is “Islam.” Right after this, it is immediately stated: “And the People of the Book only disagreed after knowledge had come to them, out of envy among themselves.” (Quran, 3:19). This means that the objections of the People of the Book to the final, accepted, and authentic status of Islam are simply due to their defiance. Otherwise, based on the knowledge they have received from previous prophets, they are well aware of Islam’s authentic status. This is the interpretation adopted by commentaries on the Quran. I will cite two references.