Tafheem ul Quran

Surah 48 Al-Fath, Ayat 28-28

هُوَ الَّذِىۡۤ اَرۡسَلَ رَسُوۡلَهٗ بِالۡهُدٰى وَدِيۡنِ الۡحَـقِّ لِيُظۡهِرَهٗ عَلَى الدِّيۡنِ كُلِّهٖ​ؕ وَكَفٰى بِاللّٰهِ شَهِيۡدًا ؕ‏ ﴿48:28﴾

(48:28) He it is Who sent His Messenger with the True Guidance and the Religion of Truth that He may make it prevail over every religion. Sufficient is Allah as a witness (to this).51


Notes

51. The reason why this thing has been mentioned here is that when at Hudaibiyah the peace treaty was going to be written down, the disbelievers had objected to the use of the words Rasul-Allah (Messenger of Allah) with the name of the Prophet (peace be upon him), and on their insistence the Prophet (peace be upon him) himself had removed these words from the document. At this Allah says: Our Messenger’s being a Messenger is a reality which remains unaffected whether someone believes in it or not. If some people do not believe in it, they may not, for Allah is enough for a witness over it. Their denial will not change the reality, but the guidance and the true faith which this Messenger (peace be upon him) has brought from Us, shall prevail over all religion, no matter how hard the deniers try to obstruct its progress.

“All religions” implies all those ways of life which include the nature of deen (religion). We have explained it in details in (E.N. 3 of Surah Az-Zumar) and( E.N. 20 of Surah Ash-Shura). Here what Allah has stated in clear words is: The purpose of the Prophet’s (peace be upon him) appointment as a Prophet was not merely to preach this religion but to make it prevail over all others. In other words, he did not bring this religion so that it might survive in a limited compartment of life, while the rest of the spheres of life, by and large, should remain under the relentless control of some false religion (way of life). But he had brought it so that it should be the dominant way of life and any other religion should survive, if at all it survives, only within the limits in which it allows it to survive. For further explanation, sec (E.N. 48 of Surah Az-Zumar).