Quran 42:13 · Ash-Shuraa

The prophets came into this world with the same religion and that is the religion of the oneness of God. But the followers of these prophets subsequently divided themselves into separate factions. The reason for this was the shift in the centre of their attention. Initially, attention was centred wholly on God: the teachings of all prophets took the form of exhorting people to worship the one and only God. That was their original religion but their followers later shifted the focus of their devotion and they became the worshippers of beings other than God. The ancient people of Arabia were initially the followers of Abraham. But, later on, the greatness of their leaders so captured their minds that they made them the sole centre of their attention. They even made idols to represent them and started worshipping them. The Jews were the followers of Moses, but they started considering their race a special one. Their attention became so concentrated on their own race, that godly religion became for them a racial matter. They rejected the last of the prophets simply because he was not born of their race. Similarly, Christians were the followers of Jesus Christ (‘Isa). But they took him to be the son of God instead of His Prophet. In this way, in the religion they later adopted, the notion of Jesus being the son of God attained the utmost importance. What God desires for His subjects is that they should be firm in the belief of the oneness of God. The one and only God should be the centre of all their attention. This constitutes real steadfastness in religion ‘din’. Any shift in this centre of attention amounts to polytheism (shirk). Whenever polytheism gains ground with the people, variations and differences immediately start making their appearance, because in the case of ‘shirk’, many centres of attention come into existence. In the case of ‘tawhid’ (unity of God), on the contrary, the centre of attention is only one—God: this creates a greater sense of unity among the faithful. Though the religion of the Prophet of Arabia is a preserved religion as far as its text is concerned, his followers are disparate in their beliefs and practices. People however, are free to make new things their centre of attention, to make changes in the original religion by having recourse to explanations and interpretations of the text, and in this way turn one religion, in practice, into several religions.