these people.
For this reason, many people would reject this account, even though they allowed that other things could occur to the prophets, whether before or after prophethood, because they assumed that this would constitute an error in conveying revelation, whereas he is, by agreement, protected from error in conveying it. The form of protection unanimously agreed upon is that he is not left to persist in an error in conveying revelation. Accordingly, no polytheist is known to have been repelled by his retracting this and saying, “This was something cast by Satan.” Rather, it is related that they were repelled when he returned to condemning their deities after they had thought that he had praised them. Thus, they turned back against him because he persisted in condemning them, not because he had said something and then declared, “Satan cast it.” If this did not drive people away, then anything else is even less likely to do so.
Moreover, it is established that abrogation did repel a group, as He said:
{The foolish among the people will say, “What has turned them away from the direction of prayer they formerly faced?”}
[Sūrat al-Baqara: 142]
And His words:
{Whenever We replace one verse with another—and Allah knows best what He sends down—they say, “You are only a fabricator.” Rather, most of them do not know. Say, “The Holy Spirit has brought it down from your Lord in truth, to make firm those who believe.”}
[Sūrat al-Nahl: 101–102]
Thus, substitution—which they explicitly described as alienating and used as grounds for turning people away from him—was not something that had to be ruled out in his case. How much less, then, should returning to the truth be ruled out, when they are not known to have used it to turn people away from him and it is less alienating? For abrogation involves moving from one truth to another, whereas this involves returning to the truth from something untrue.
It is well known that a person is commended for abandoning falsehood in favor of truth to a degree that he is not commended for—