The Holy Quran with Five Volume Commentary (Vol 2) — Page 92
CH. 3 ĀL-E-‘IMRĀN PT. 4 فَمَنِ افْتَرى عَلَى اللهِ الْكَذِبَ مِنْ Now whoso forges a lie. 95 بَعْدِ ذلِكَ فَأُولَيكَ هُمُ الظَّلِمُونَ قف against Allah after this, then it is these that are the wrongdoers. 381 قُلْ صَدَقَ اللهُ فَاتَّبِعُوا مِلَّةَ إِبْرَاهِيمَ Say, Allah has spoken the. 96 حَنِيفًا ۖ وَمَا كَانَ مِنَ الْمُشْرِكِينَ truth: follow, therefore, the religion of Abraham, "who was ever inclined to God; and he was not of those who associate gods with God. '382 "See 3:68. nerve as food. This was a personal matter but the Children of Israel followed his example blindly and made it a rule of conduct to abstain from the eating of the sinew. It was not forbidden by Law, the abstention being purely voluntary. Moreover, the incident which led to the abandonment of the sciatic nerve as food by Israel and later by the Israelites took place long before the Torah was revealed. The Torah itself does not forbid it but merely mentions it as a practice of the Jews who had, therefore, no right to object to its use by the Muslims. The objection, if valid, also held good against Abraham and many other Prophets. Besides, there are some foods which were used by Abraham and his descendants but were later forbidden by the Torah. The camel is an instance of this kind. Hence, the verse purports to say that if certain foods used by the patriarchs are allowed to other peoples, the Jews have no right to object. 532 It may be pointed out here that there is a difference of meaning between (kullu-ṭa ‘amin) and (kullut-ta'āmi) as used in the present verse. The former means, every kind of food, while the latter means, all food, i. e. the whole food. It appears that the Jews objected that the Muslims ate the whole meat, not excepting even the nerve. 381. Commentary: The word Us (this) refers to the statement made in the preceding verse. To say that such and such parts of food were disallowed by God whereas He had not forbidden them, or even without directly attributing any commandant to God persistently to abstain from partaking of a lawful food without just reason virtually amounted to forging a lie against God which only wrongdoers could resort to. 382. Commentary: By saying that Abraham was ever obedient to God, the verse hints that