The Quran

Preface

فَلَمّا جاءَهُمُ الحَقُّ مِن عِندِنا قالوا لَولا أوتِيَ مِثلَ ما أوتِيَ موسىٰ ۚ أَوَلَم يَكفُروا بِما أوتِيَ موسىٰ مِن قَبلُ ۖ قالوا سِحرانِ تَظاهَرا وَقالوا إِنّا بِكُلٍّ كافِرونَ

Yusuf Ali

But (now), when the Truth has come to them from Ourselves, they say, “Why are not (Signs) sent to him, like those which were sent to Moses?”¹ Do they not then reject (the Signs) which were formerly sent to Moses? They say: “Two kinds of sorcery, each assisting the other!”² And they say: “For us, we reject all (such things)!”

When a Revelation is sent to them, in the Qur-ān, adapted to all their needs and the needs of the time they live in, they hark back to antiquity. The Prophet was in many respects like Moses, but the times in which he lived were different from the times of Moses, and his age did not suffer from the deceptions of sorcery, like that of Moses. The remedies which his age and future ages required (for his Message was universal) were different. His miracle of the Qur-ān was different and most permanent than the Rod and the Radiant- White Hand of Moses. But supposing that Quraish had been humoured in their insincere demands, would they have believed? Did they believe in Moses? They were only put up by the jews to make objections which they themselves did not believe in.
Moses was called a sorcerer by the Egyptians, and the wonderful words of the Qur-ān were called sorcery by Quraish. As the Qur-ān confirmed the Message of Moses, Quraish objectors said that they were in collusion. Quraish did not believe in God’s Revelation at all.