The Romans, the Greeks, and others were polytheists who worshipped the celestial spheres and the terrestrial idols. Accordingly, the Messiah, peace be upon him, sent out his messengers to invite them to the religion of God, exalted is He. Some of those envoys set off while he was still on earth, and others after he had been raised to heaven. They summoned the people to God’s religion, and some of them entered God’s religion.

They remained upon that for a time, until Satan adorned for certain people the notion of altering the Messiah’s faith. They therefore devised a new creed, a composite drawn from God’s true religion—the religion of the Messiah, peace be upon him—and from the faith of the polytheists.

Now the polytheists worshipped sculpted idols, solid statues that cast a shadow. This was the religion of the Romans and the Greeks, the creed embraced by the philosophers of Macedon and Athens.