Approaching the West — Page 154
A pproaching the West—154 Signs of All ā h will Never cease to Come Commenting on the verse ‘And nothing could hinder Us from sending Signs, except that the former people rejected them’ (17:60), the editors of the English Translation and Commentary write, The verse beautifully states that heavenly Signs will never cease to appear. It … proceeds to refute and demolish the only possible objection against the appearance of the heavenly Signs. The objection is: When the people to whom the Signs were first shown did not profit by them, where was the warrant that their successors would do so? The arguments given to this objection are: (a) If the rejection of heavenly Signs had been a reasonable ground, no Prophet after the very first Prophet—Adam—would have appeared. But this did not happen and fresh Prophets continued to appear in all ages and fresh signs continued to be shown at their hands, which showed that the rejection of the Signs never proved a barrier in the way of appearance of new Signs. (b) Prophets are sent in the world in order to warn wrongdoers of their aggressions and iniquities and of the impending divine punishment in consequence of those iniquities.