Combining the Preference of the Children of Israel with the Excellence of This Ummah
Machine translationRead the Arabic original
Question:
This questioner says: How do we reconcile, may Allah preserve you, the saying of Allah the Exalted regarding the Children of Israel[Al-Jathiyah 45:16] and His saying [Ali 'Imran 3:110] regarding the believers?
Answer:
We preferred them over the worlds, and He preferred you over the worlds, meaning in their time. Yes, they were the best of the people of their time. The Children of Israel were the best of the people of their time. As for them being the best of the entire world, all of it, no. But they were the best of the people of their time. Yes, they were mostly believers. Most of them were upon faith. Their origin was in faith. They were like the polytheists. Yes.
This questioner says: How do we reconcile, may Allah preserve you, the saying of Allah the Exalted regarding the Children of Israel
and preferred them over the worlds.
وَفَضَّلْنَاهُمْ عَلَى الْعَالَمِينَYou are the best nation
كُنتُمْ خَيْرَ أُمَّةٍ أُخْرِجَتْAnswer:
We preferred them over the worlds, and He preferred you over the worlds, meaning in their time. Yes, they were the best of the people of their time. The Children of Israel were the best of the people of their time. As for them being the best of the entire world, all of it, no. But they were the best of the people of their time. Yes, they were mostly believers. Most of them were upon faith. Their origin was in faith. They were like the polytheists. Yes.
Source
وجوب الأمر بالمعروف والنهي عن المنكر، بداية من قول المُصَنِّف : وقد كان المسلمون في عهده وعهد أصحابه — islamhouse.com (48:40)
The Arabic text is a machine transcription of the audio recording.