Quranic Sciences

81. " And they have taken gods besides Allah that they might be for them a glory."

82. " No, soon they (gods) shall deny their worship, and become adversaries against them.”

Commentary

This verse points to another motive of the idolaters in worshipping idols when it says:

" And they have taken gods besides Allah that they might be for them a glory."

They worship idols in order that they intercede for them with Allah and help them in their difficulties; but what a vain and wrong imagination! Never it is such that they imagined. The idols not only do not create honour for them but also cause their disgrace and painful punishment, and soon, i.e. in Hereafter, these idols will deny their worship and repudiate them, and they will be some enemies against them. The holy verse says:

" No, soon they (gods) shall deny their worship, and become adversaries against them."

It is narrated from Imam Sadiq (a.s.) who has said: "On Hereafter Day the gods, which they had taken besides Allah, will be against them and will repudiate them and their worships." That is, these idols, by the command of Allah, will be able to speak on the Day of Judgment and will repudiate from pagans and the worshippers of them.

It is interesting that there has been cited a short and expressive sentence below this tradition about the reality of worship. It says: "Worship is not (only) prostration and bowing, but the reality of worship is to obey men. Whoever obeys a mortal in disobedience to Allah, he has obeyed him." (And, therefore, his fate will be the same as the fate of pagans and idolaters.) 78

Notes:

78. Nur-uth-Thaqalayn, vol. 3, p. 357, and Tafsir-ul-Burhan, Tafsir-us-Safi

Adopted from the book : "The Light of the Holy Qur'an; Interpretation of Surah Maryam" by : "Sayyid Kamal Faghih Imani and a Group of Muslim Scholars"