أَوَلَا يَعْلَمُونَ أَنَّ اللَّهَ يَعْلَمُ مَا يُسِرُّونَ وَمَا يُعْلِنُونَ

وَمِنْهُمْ أُمِّيُّونَ لَا يَعْلَمُونَ الْكِتَابَ إِلَّا أَمَانِيَّ وَإِنْ هُمْ إِلَّا يَظُنُّونَ

فَوَيْلٌ لِلَّذِينَ يَكْتُبُونَ الْكِتَابَ بِأَيْدِيهِمْ ثُمَّ يَقُولُونَ هَٰذَا مِنْ عِنْدِ اللَّهِ لِيَشْتَرُوا

بِهِ ثَمَنًا قَلِيلًا ۖ فَوَيْلٌ لَهُمْ مِمَّا كَتَبَتْ أَيْدِيهِمْ وَوَيْلٌ لَهُمْ مِمَّا يَكْسِبُونَ

"Are they not aware that Allah knows what they conceal and what they manifest? And some among them are illiterate who have no knowledge of the Book but have some fancies, and they do nothing but make conjectures. So, woe to those who write the Book with their hands and then say, "This is from Allah", so that they may gain a small price out of it. Then, woe to them for what their hands have written, and woe to them for what they earn." (2:77-79)

Allah (سبحانه وتعالى) reminds the Jews that He is omniscient, and knows what they try to keep concealed as well as what they say or do openly. So, it would make no difference at all, if the hypocrites tried to conceal their infidelity from the Muslims, or the other group, not to disclose the verses of the Torah which speak of the Holy Prophet (صلى الله عليه وسلم). For, Allah Himself has, on different occasibns, informed the Muslims in the Holy Qur'an as to the hypocrisy of certain Jews and as to the testimony of the Torah also.

Verse 77 deals with the educated ones among the Jews, while Verse 78 speaks of those who were unlettered. These men had no knowledge of the Torah, and were even deficient in their understanding. Then, the Jewish scholars did not give them correct or proper information about their religion. No wonder, their minds were stuffed only with baseless superstitions which they found very pleasant and flattering.

Since the dishonesty of their scholars was the real cause of their superstitiousness, the crime of the former was greater than that of the latter. So, Verse 79 turns to the Jewish scholars. They were greedy and self-seeking, and in order to please the people for receiving money and respect from them, they used to misrepresent divine injunctions, going so far as to change the words of the Torah or distort the sense, pretending all the while that this was just what Allah had said or meant. The Verse 79 announces a grievous punishment for these two sins - distorting the Word of Allah and earning money by doing so.

A Doctrinal Point

Verse 78 says that the illiterate Jews follow their "Zann", that is to say, their fancies or conjectures. Some people do not pay any attention to the context in which the word has been used here, and come to the erroneous conclusion that it is not legitimate to accept or follow any view or injunction based on "Zann", which they always translate as "a fanciful supposition." This, no doubt, is one of the lexical meanings of the word, but only one. Let us explain that the Holy Qur'an uses the word "Zann" in three ways:-

(1) To signify perfect certitude -"Those who are certain that they are going to meet their Lord" (2:46). (2) To signify the greatest likelihood - "And he said to him whom he thought was the more likely of the two to be released from the prison" (12:42). (3) To signify a mere fanciful supposition - as in the present verse. The Zann which the Holy Qur'an prohibits us to follow is that of the third kind. This verse condemns the Jews for having followed this kind of qann which consists in a fanciful opinion that is not supported by a respectable argument or goes against a valid one. On the contrary, it is necessary to follow the Zann of the first two kinds. When certain ahadeeth or certain arguments and conclusions in the shari'ah are described as resting on Zann, it is done according to the second signification of the word. One cannot avoid this kind of Zann in any sphere of life, and the shari'ah requires us to accept and follow it. Certain verses of the Holy Qur'an, of course, condemn those who follow their Zann, but to apply this condemnation to all the possible cases, and to use such verses for rejecting all the legitimate arguments and injunctions of the shari'ah based on Zann is to betray one's ignorance of the Holy Qur'an. (Ma'ariful Qur'an)

» Posted by Seifeddine-M on 18th February 2011

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