Surah An-Nisa (The Women — النساء) (Ayah 45)

The book of God is given to a community so that it may rectify the thinking and conduct of its people. But when the bearers of the Divine Book, like the Jews, suffer from decline, they begin to take misguidance in place of guidance from it. The commands of God become the subject of futile hair-splitting discussions; concocted philosophies are produced in the name of theology, and wrongdoers alter the divine book to justify the religious validity of their actions. They detach the words of God from their context and interpret them on the basis of their own assumptions. The Jews having received a portion of the Book means that they were able to read the words of the Book, but could not mould their actions according to those words, thereby defeating the real purpose of the Scriptures. They remained the bearers of the Book so far as its words were concerned, but in the matter of practice they adopted the ways of other worldly communities. Moreover, while the others practised worldliness in the name of worldliness, the Jews adopted the same worldly ways but had the audacity to try to justify their practices by misquoting the Divine Book.