Tag Archives: Quranic verses 2:78-79

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Surah 2 Al-Baqarah, Ayat 78-79

Audio discussion of the summary:

https://notebooklm.google.com/notebook/5b87dbb3-f15b-46b0-b615-49f021f747a2/audio

وَ مِنۡهُمۡ اُمِّيُّوۡنَ لَا يَعۡلَمُوۡنَ الۡكِتٰبَ اِلَّاۤ اَمَانِىَّ وَاِنۡ هُمۡ اِلَّا يَظُنُّوۡنَ‏ ﴿2:78﴾ فَوَيۡلٌ لِّلَّذِيۡنَ يَكۡتُبُوۡنَ الۡكِتٰبَ بِاَيۡدِيۡهِمۡ ثُمَّ يَقُوۡلُوۡنَ هٰذَا مِنۡ عِنۡدِ اللّٰهِ لِيَشۡتَرُوۡا بِهٖ ثَمَنًا قَلِيۡلًا ؕ فَوَيۡلٌ لَّهُمۡ مِّمَّا کَتَبَتۡ اَيۡدِيۡهِمۡ وَوَيۡلٌ لَّهُمۡ مِّمَّا يَكۡسِبُوۡنَ‏ ﴿2:79﴾

(2:78) Among them are also the unlettered folk who do not know about the Scriptures but cherish baseless wishes and merely follow their conjectures.89 (2:79) Woe, then, to those who write out the Scriptures with their own hands and then, in order to make a trifling gain, claim: “This is from Allah.”90 Woe to them for what their hands have written and woe to them for what they thus earn. 

Notes

89. This was the state of the Jewish masses. They were ignorant of the Scriptures, unaware of the principles of faith as enunciated by God in His Book, unaware of the rules of conduct that He had laid down, and of the teachings which are of fundamental importance for man’s salvation. Because they lacked this knowledge, they fabricated a whole religion out of their desires and fancies, living in a paradise built on false hopes and illusions. 

90. These observations relate to their rabbis. They were not content with misinterpreting the Word of God. They also interjected into it their readings of the Scriptures and their explanatory comments thereof, stories from their national history, superstitious ideas and fancies, philosophical doctrines and legal rules. The result was that the Divine and the human became inextricably mixed. They claimed, nevertheless, that the entire thing was divine! Every historical anecdote, the interpretation of every commentator, the doctrine of every theologian, and the legal deduction of every jurist that managed to find its way into the Bible became the ‘Word of God’. It was thus obligatory to believe in all that, and every deviation from it became tantamount to deviation from the true faith.