Surah 53. An-Najm, Ayah 27

Lit., "that name the angels with a female name" - i.e., think of them as being endowed with sex and/or as being "God's daughters". As the Qur'an points out in many places, the people spoken of in this context do believe in life after death, inasmuch as they express the hope that the angels and the imaginary deities which they worship will "mediate" between them and God, and will "intercede" for them. However, their belief is far too vague to make them realize that the quality of man's life in the hereafter does not depend on such outside factors but is causally, and directly, connected with the manner of his life in this world: and so the Qur'an declares that their attitude is, for all practical purposes, not much different from the attitude of people who reject the idea of a hereafter altogether.

Cf. liii. 21, above, and n. 5096. The Pagan Quraish had no firm belief in the Hereafter. Their prayers for intercession to angels and deities was on account of their worldly affairs.