to bring us nearer to Allah.’” 1 Ibn Kathīr explains this verse as follows:

“Then the Most High tells us that the idol-worshipping polytheists say, ‘We worship them only to bring us nearer to Allah.’ What prompted their worship was that they had fashioned idols which, as they claimed, represented the angels brought near to Allah. They worshipped these images, treating this as worship of the angels, so that the angels would intercede for them with Allah for victory, provision, and whatever befell them in worldly affairs. As for the resurrection, they denied it and disbelieved in it. Qatādah, al-Suddī, Mālik—reporting from Zayd ibn Aslam—and Ibn Zayd explained ‘only to bring us nearer to Allah’ as meaning: to intercede for us and bring us nearer to Him in standing.

“That is why, when performing the pilgrimage in their pre-Islamic days of ignorance, they would recite the pilgrimage invocation: ‘Here I am at Your service! You have no partner, except a partner who belongs to You; You own [him] and all that he owns.’” 2

I say: This provides a most forceful refutation of the writer’s claim that the polytheists did not acknowledge that Allah is the Creator and Provider. Moreover, he offered no evidence for this claim except his statement:

“… If they had acknowledged that Allah—glorified and exalted is He—is the Creator of the heavens and the earth and all they contain, He would not have addressed them with those verses commanding them to reflect on how camels were created, how mountains were set up, how the earth was spread out, and how the sky was raised.”

I say: The answer is that the purpose here is reflection that leads them to worship Him alone, not to establish the existence of the Creator, for they already knew this, and acknowledging it is not enough. Ibn Kathīr—may Allah have mercy on him—has already been quoted as saying: “If that is so [that is, Allah is the Creator