Surah Ibrahim (Abraham ) 14 : 30

Explanatory Note 

These people have exchanged God’s blessing of a messenger sent to them with disbelief. The messenger called on them to believe in God alone and to associate no partners with Him, but they abandoned all this, and set up false deities. They place their false deities in a position equal to that of God, and offer worship to them as they would offer it to Him. They submit to these false deities as they would submit to Him, and they attribute to them some of the attributes that belong only to God. They thus lead people astray from the only straight path leading to God, the only deity in the universe.

The chiefs or elders have deliberately misguided their own people, leading them astray by claiming that their false deities were equal to God. The fact, however, is that the faith based on God’s oneness represents a threat to the power and vested interests of tyrannical forces in every generation, not merely in this first period of jāhiliyyah when the Prophet preached his message. Whenever people turn away from the pure faith based on God’s oneness, whatever shape this may take, and assign their leadership to others, they revert to a state of un-Islam, or jāhiliyyah. In such a state, people surrender their own freedom and personality, follow their desires and implement laws enacted on the basis of their leaders’ desires instead of deriving them from God’s revelations. In such a situation the advocacy of God’s oneness becomes a threat to those chiefs and their interests. Hence, they try to avert this threat in every way open to them. In older forms of jāhiliyyah, this took the shape of adopting false deities, claiming that they were equal to God. In our present time, it takes the form of implementing man-made laws that permit what God has not permitted and prohibit what He has made lawful. Those who enact such laws are thus placed on an equal footing with God in the way people look at them and in everyday life as well.

Hence, the Prophet is instructed to say to such people that they may enjoy themselves in this life as they please, but that this enjoyment will last only for the limit God has determined.