﴿ يَٰقَوْمِ إِنَّمَا هَٰذِهِ ٱلْحَيَوٰةُ ٱلدُّنْيَا مَتَٰعٌۭ وَإِنَّ ٱلْءَاخِرَةَ هِىَ دَارُ ٱلْقَرَارِ ﴾

““O my people! This worldly life is but a brief enjoyment, whereas, behold, the life to come is the home abiding.”

In other words the sentence, ‘I call you towards the Lord of the Universe, whereas you call me towards one who is quite ineffectual both in this world and in the Hereafter.’ This presents the gist of the speech of a true believer. This gives an idea of what was being discussed in Pharaoh’s court. The discussion was on whether God or other man-made deities should be invoked. The true believer said that God is a living and dominant entity. Calling upon Him amounts to calling upon the real God. As opposed to this, he said that their deities were only the creation of their imagination or objects of superstition, and were of no avail either in this world or in the world Hereafter. When they (the deities) have no real existence, how can they confer any real advantage? (Tafsir ibn Kathir, vol. IV, p. 80).