(6) “If any one of the polytheists seeks your protection, then grant him protection so that he may hear the word of Allah; then escort him to a place of safety. That is because they are a people who do not know.”

The preceding words—“Then, when the sacred months have passed, kill the polytheists wherever you find them, take them captive, besiege them, and lie in wait for them at every place of ambush”—constituted a general command applying to all circumstances and every individual among them. Allah therefore states that if some benefit may be achieved by allowing certain among them to draw near, doing so is permissible—indeed, obligatory. Thus He says, “If any one of the polytheists seeks your protection”—that is, he asks you to grant him protection and safeguard him from harm so that he may hear the word of Allah and consider the reality of Islam.

“Then grant him protection so that he may hear the word of Allah.” If he then embraces Islam, that is the desired outcome; otherwise, escort him to a place of safety—that is, somewhere he will be secure. The reason is that the disbelievers are a people who do not know. Their persistence in disbelief may therefore be due to ignorance on their part; if that ignorance is removed, they may choose Islam over disbelief. Allah therefore commanded His Messenger—and his ummah, which follows his example in matters of law—to grant protection to anyone who asks to hear the word of Allah.

This is explicit proof for the position of Sunni orthodoxy that the Quran is the uncreated speech of Allah. For it is Allah Himself who speaks it, and He ascribes it to Himself as an attribute is ascribed to the one possessing it. It also establishes the invalidity of the doctrine of the Mutazilites and those who adopted their view that the Quran is created.

There are many proofs demonstrating the invalidity of this view, but this is not the place to mention them.