Now comes a very important question that we should ask ourselves: Why does Allah SWT mention this story? What was the reason for the revelation?

At the time of the Prophet, there was a group in Madina of the Nawasib (the enemies) and the hypocrites from amongst the companions who aligned with the Jews of Madina to form a task force with the mission to conspire against the Prophet and against Islam. At that time, the Prophet PBUH performed many miracles. Unfortunately, the Muslims and the companions hide most of these miracles which the Prophet performed. The miracles were performed by both the Prophet and Imam Ali AS. Imam Ali AS by the order of the Prophet SAWW performed a lot of miracles to show that he is truly, really the real successor of the Prophet, it is not just the khutbah of the day of Ghadir, there was a physical evidence for the successorship of the Imam AS. He talked to the sun and the moon. He talked to the graves and fought the jinn.

So this task force between the conspirators and hypocrites amongst the companions of the Prophet and a group of the Jews, gathered together to find a solution for those miracles and the signs of Allah being exhibited by Imam Ali AS.

So the Jews told them that we have in our books that Suleiman was not a prophet rather a magician. He learned some magic crafts and that's why he was able to perform miracles but they were not really miracles rather cheap magic tricks. So we think that your prophet Muhammad and his successor Ali AS have learned some of this magic craft like Suleiman, from Satan. And that is how they are able to perform this magic in front of you. For example: Dividing the moon into two parts (Shakq al Qamar), calling the trees, talking to the sun, talking to the moon, sitting alive the dead, talking to animals and others. All these are not miracles, it’s just magic from Muhammad and Ali AS  because of what they have learned from the old kind of magic that came down with Harut and Marut. And they did exactly like Suleiman, and Suleiman was not a prophet.

So they adopted and started spreading this propaganda against the Prophet and against Imam Ali AS. That is why Allah SWT revealed that ayat and followed it with elaboration of what the Shayateen taught. This was to exonerate Suleiman AS and to exonerate the Prophet SWT and Imam Ali AS.

If you notice that the ayat in Surah Al-Baqarah which talks about Bani Israel from verse number 40 to verse number 148. All these ayah continuously talk about Bani Israel and their harmful effect on Islam and how they gave tough time to their Prophets starting from Musa, all their prophet until the Prophet Mohammad SAWW. And this verse, verse number 102, came as a part of these verses which are talking about Bani Israel.

Therefore, we should go and read the Quran. We will find clearly that Allah SWT mentions that story in the context of talking about Bani Israel and their plotting against Islam and they are denying signs that they saw as proofs of the authenticity of the prophethood of the Prophet Muhammad SWT and the wilayah and the successorship of Amir al-Mu'mineen Ali Ibn Abu-Talib AS, which is present in their books as one package. But they denied it and they followed Satan as they did when they followed Satan during the time of Prophet Sulaiman AS.