We may understand the nature of this argument and the subject of the dispute...

We may understand the nature of this argument and the subject of the dispute, if we look at the context of the verse and reflect upon the behavior of mankind in the past as well as in the present. Man, by his nature, has always remained submissive to the powers about him which effect, in one way or the other, his life. No student of anthropology, who has studied the behavior of the ancients, or has looked at the present generations of various nations, can have any doubt about it.

We have described it in preceding discourses; and also it has been pointed out that man, by his nature, accepts that there is a Creator for the universe, Who has brought it into existence, and Who manages it. Every man, by the dictate of nature, believes this - be he a monotheist (a follower of the prophets), a polytheist (like an idol-worshipper) or an atheist (like a materialist).

Nature's demand cannot be negated so long as man is man (although the effect of it may at times become weaker or dormant). Primitive man, in his simplicity, thought of every thing in the light of his own experience. He saw that he performs different acts by means of his different organs and limbs; and likewise, in society's structure, various people discharge various duties and functions.

And the natural phenomena in the world happen because of their respective natural causes which are closely related to them. Yet, his nature led him to believe in a Creator who had all the affairs of the universe in His hand. Not surprisingly, he thought that every phenomenon of the world had a special deity of its own - and all those deities were under the authority of a Supreme God.

Sometimes he named them deities for various things; for example, the deity of the earth, the deity of the rivers, the deity of fire, the deity of wind, etc. At other times, he attributed these functions to the stars, and especially to the planets, the sun and the moon, ascribing to each various faculties believing that each of them affected this world of ours in its own way. This belief was held by the Sabaeans. The next stage was to make images and statues for those lesser deities.

Then he started to worship those idols so that the particular image might intercede on behalf of the worshipper with its particular deity, which in its turn was expected to intercede with the Supreme God - thus ensuring bliss and success for the worshipper in this life and after death.