Muhammad Asad, The Message of the Qur’ān; Translated and Explained by Muhammad Asad (1980)
approaching Jacob, he said unto his sons: “Whom will you worship after I am gone?”
They answered: “We will worship thy God, the God of thy forefathers Abraham and Ishmael 108 and Isaac, the One God; and unto Him will we surrender ourselves.”
(134) Now those people have passed away; unto them shall be accounted what they have earned, and unto you, what you have earned; and you will not be judged on the strength of what they did.109
(135) And they say, “Be Jews” – or, “Christians” – “and you shall be on the right path.” Say: “Nay, but [ours is] the creed of Abraham, who turned away from all that is false,110 and was not of those who ascribe divinity to aught beside God.”
(136) Say: “We believe in God, and in that which has been bestowed from on high upon us, and that which has been bestowed upon Abraham and Ishmael and Isaac and Jacob and their descendants,111 and that which has been vouchsafed to Moses and Jesus, and that which has been vouchsafed to all the [other] prophets by their Sustainer: we make no distinction between any of them.112 And it is unto Him that we surrender ourselves.”
(137) And if [others] come to believe in the way you believe, they will indeed find themselves on the right
which stands at the beginning of this sentence is not always used in the interrogative sense (“is it that…?”): sometimes – and especially when it is syntactically unconnected with the preceding sentence, as in this case – it is an equivalent of bal (“rather”, or “nay, but”), and has no interrogative connotation.
108 In classical Arabic, as in ancient Hebrew usage, the term ab (“father”) was applied not only to the direct male parent but also to grandfathers and even more distant ancestors, as well as to paternal uncles: which explains why Ishmael, who was Jacob’s uncle, is mentioned in this context. Since he was the first-born of Abraham’s sons, his name precedes that of Isaac.
109 Lit., “you will not be asked about what they did”. This verse, as well as verse 141 below, stresses the fundamental Islamic tenet of individual responsibility, and denies the Jewish idea of their being “the chosen people” by virtue of their descent, as well as – by implication – the Christian doctrine of an “original sin” with which all human beings are supposedly burdened because of Adam’s fall from grace.
110 The expression ḥānif is derived from the verb ḥanafa, which literally means “he inclined [towards a right state or tendency]” (cf. Lane II, 658). Already in pre-Islamic times, this term had a definitely monotheistic connotation, and was used to describe a man who turned away from sin and worldliness and from all dubious beliefs, especially idol-worship; and taḥannuf denoted the ardent devotions, mainly consisting of long vigils and prayers, of the unitarian God-seekers of pre-Islamic times. Many instances of this use of the terms ḥanif and taḥannuf occur in the verses of pre-Islamic poets, e.g., Umayyah ibn Abi ’ṣ-Ṣalt and Jīrān al-ʿAwd (cf. Lisān al-ʿArab, art. ḥanafa).
111 Lit., “the grandchildren” (al-asbāṭ, sing. sibṭ)-a term used in the Qurʾān to describe, in the first instance, Abraham’s, Isaac’s and Jacob’s immediate descendants, and, consequently, the twelve tribes which evolved from this ancestry.
112 I.e., “we regard them all as true prophets of God”.
