The Message of the Qur’an
Al-Risala (English), August 1985, p. 18
By Maulana Wahiduddin Khan
Maulana Wahiduddin Khan is named as the default author of the periodical; a piece that carries another writer’s byline is credited to that writer.
The Message of the Qur’an
1985 8 August 18-19 The Message of the Qur’an (1147)
CHAPTER II, (contd.)
“To Moses We gave the Scripture and after him We sent other messengers. We gave Jesus, the son of Mary, clear signs and strengthened him with the Holy Spirit. Will you then scorn each apostle, whose message does not suit your fancies, charging some with imposture and slaying others? They say: ‘Our hearts are sealed.’ But God has cursed them for their unbelief. They have but little faith. And when a Book confirming their own has come to them from God, while before that they used to pray for help against those who disbelieved – when there came to them what they knew to be true they denied it. But the curse of God is upon those without faith. Miserable is the price for which they have sold their souls: that they should deny God’s own revelation, grudging that He should reveal His bounty to whom he chooses of His servants. They have incurred wrath upon wrath. An ignominious punishment awaits the unbelievers (2:87-90).”
The Torah was the Book of God, revealed to the Jews. Gradually, however, the Jews ceased to treat it as a source of divine guidance and came to regard it as a sacred relic of their national heritage, a symbol of ethnic superiority; it became more a guarantee of salvation than a guide as to how salvation can be earned. After Moses, several prophets arose among the Jewish people – Joshua, David, Zakaria, John the Baptist and finally Jesus, to name but a few – all of whom stressed to the Jews that it was not enough just to revere the Torah as a holy book, its teachings had to be actually practised; it is no good believing in the sacredness of the holy scriptures if one does not implement their message in one’s everyday life. But the Jews, the very people who held the Torah in such high esteem, were unable to abide the Prophet’s exhortations.
The reason for such a reaction on their part was that they had allowed self-interest and worldly ambitions to rule their lives, but passed themselves off as bearers and upholders of the true faith. As long as the religion served to consolidate their worldly status, they welcomed it, but were loath to accept the message of truth – presented to them in all its purity – which they saw as a threat to the hegemony they had secured for themselves on the basis of religion. It was their egoism which came in the way. Instead of being the first to believe in it, they rejected the message as well as the messenger, subjecting God’s prophets to scorn and victimization. They called them imposters and even went to the extent of killing them.
The Jews of Arabia did just the same thing with the Prophet Mohammad. They had seen prophecies of the coming of a final prophet in their scriptures, and had eagerly anticipated his arrival. When he comes, they used to say, we will join with him in a grand alliance against the pagans and idolaters. But these proved to be empty words on their part, a pretence aimed at consolidating their status as undisputed guardians of divine faith. When the Prophet came, the truth of their position was exposed. They were shown to be steeped in prejudice, loathe to believe in a prophet who did not come from the Jewish race. They could not dispute the veritable signs that the Qur’an presented in support of his prophethood; all they could say was: “It all sounds very impressive, but our ancestral religion is good enough for us: Our hearts are sealed and we will not accept anything besides the faith we have inherited from our forefathers.”
“When it is said to them: ‘Believe in what God has revealed,’ they reply: ‘We believe in what was revealed to us.’ But they deny what has since been revealed, although it is the truth, corroborating their own Scriptures. Say: ‘Why did you kill the prophets of God, if you are true believers? Moses came to you with clear signs, but in his absence you worshipped the calf and committed evil.’ When we made a covenant with you and raised the Mount above you (saying): ‘Hold firmly to what We have given you and hear (Our Commandments),’ they replied: ‘We hear, but disobey.’ For their unbelief, they were made to imbibe (the love of) the calf into their very hearts. Say: ‘Evil is that to which your faith prompts you if you are indeed believers.’ Say: ‘If the abode of the Hereafter with God is for you alone to the exclusion of all others then invoke death if you are sincere.’ But they will never invoke death, because of what they did; and God knows the evil-doers. Indeed, you will find that they love this life more than other men: more than the pagans do. Every one of them wishes to live a thousand years. But this prolonged life will surely not save him from (due) punishment. God is watching over their actions (2:91-96).”
The Jews were not ready to accept the Quran because they thought they were already rightly guided. They were sure that the very fact that they were Israelites would be enough to earn them salvation. But in fact this was more a feeling of ethnic superiority on their part than an affinity for truth: the Jews had been recipients of divine scriptures in the past so they felt that they, and only they, were custodians of truth. If they had really been on the path of truth, they would have rushed to accept the pure, untainted version of it revealed in the Quran, especially since it confirmed the prophecies in their own scriptures; they would have realized that once the Quran had been revealed, its teachings should be followed rather than those which had been handed down to them by their forefathers.
The fact that the Jews were not really concerned with truth is proved by their own history. It was they who had slain their own prophets, such as Zakaria and John the Baptist, the only reason for their action being that these prophets had criticized the Jews’ mode of living, and sought to bring them back to the divine way (Nehemiah 9:26). They had been Moses perform undeniable miracles, but when he left them to spend forty days on Mount Sinai they started worshipping the calf; it had only been his personal authority which had kept them in line. When the Mount was raised threateningly above their heads, they temporarily agreed to do “all that the Lord hath spoken” (Exodus, 19:5, 8, 16, 18), but, after that, most of them returned to their disobedient ways. If they had really been seeking God, their attention would have been entirely focused on the life after death; but, in fact, they are more attracted than anyone to the life of this world.
