﴿ ۞ لَيْسُوا۟ سَوَآءًۭ ۗ مِّنْ أَهْلِ ٱلْكِتَٰبِ أُمَّةٌۭ قَآئِمَةٌۭ يَتْلُونَ ءَايَٰتِ ٱللَّهِ ءَانَآءَ ٱلَّيْلِ وَهُمْ يَسْجُدُونَ ﴾

“[But] they are not all alike: among the followers of earlier revelation there are upright people, who recite God's messages throughout the night, and prostrate themselves [before Him].”

This refers here to the conduct of the People of the Book (believers in former revealed scriptures), and their immediate recognition and acceptance, in all humility, of the divine truth as proclaimed from the lips of the Last Prophet. At that time there was, on the one hand, the religion of Moses, invested with all the strength of historical grandeur and sanctity of tradition. On the other hand stood the religion of the Prophet Muhammad, which had yet to acquire the force of argument, historical grandeur and traditional sanctity to support it. This difference between Moses’ religion and the religion of the Prophet of the time posed the greatest obstacle to the acknowledgment of the latter’s religion. Yet this obstacle was successfully overcome and the religion of the contemporary Prophet was welcomed.