The Prophets
IN THE NAME OF GOD, THE MOST GRACIOUS, THE DISPENSER OF GRACE[21:3]
their hearts set on passing delights; yet they who are [thus] bent on wrongdoing conceal their innermost thoughts [when they say to one another], "Is this [Muhammad] anything but a mortal like yourselves? Will you, then, yield to [his] spellbinding eloquence with your eyes open?"

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* v.3 : See next note.
* As regards my occasional rendering of sihr (lit., “sorcery” or “magic”) as “spellbinding eloquence,” see 74:24, where this term occurs for the first time in the chronology of Qur’anic revelation. – By rejecting the message of the Qur’ān on the specious plea that Muhammad is but a human being endowed with “spellbinding eloquence,” the opponents of the Qur’anic doctrine in reality “conceal their innermost thoughts”: for their rejection is due not so much to any pertinent criticism of this doctrine as, rather, to their instinctive, deep-set unwillingness to submit to the moral and spiritual discipline which an acceptance of the Prophet’s call would entail.