The Quran

Preface

إِنّا أَنزَلنَا التَّوراةَ فيها هُدًى وَنورٌ ۚ يَحكُمُ بِهَا النَّبِيّونَ الَّذينَ أَسلَموا لِلَّذينَ هادوا وَالرَّبّانِيّونَ وَالأَحبارُ بِمَا استُحفِظوا مِن كِتابِ اللَّهِ وَكانوا عَلَيهِ شُهَداءَ ۚ فَلا تَخشَوُا النّاسَ وَاخشَونِ وَلا تَشتَروا بِآياتي ثَمَنًا قَليلًا ۚ وَمَن لَم يَحكُم بِما أَنزَلَ اللَّهُ فَأُولٰئِكَ هُمُ الكافِرونَ

Yusuf Ali

It was We who revealed the law (to Moses): therein was guidance and light¹. By its standard have been judged the Jews, by the prophets who bowed (as in Islam) to God’s will, by the rabbis² and the doctors of law: for to them was entrusted the protection of God’s book, and they were witnesses thereto³: therefore fear not men, but fear me, and sell not my signs for a miserable price⁴. If any do fail to judge by (the light of) what God hath revealed, they are (no better than) Unbelievers.

Guidance, with reference to conduct; tight, with reference to insight into the higher realms of the spirit.
Rabbaniyun may, I think, be rightly translated by the Jewish title of Rabbi for their learned men. Jewish learning is identified with Rabbinical literature. Ahbar is the plural of hibr or habr, by which we may understand Jewish Doctors of Law. Later the term was applied to those of other religions. Query: Is the word connected with the same root as “Hebrew”, or “Eber”, (Gen. 10:21), the ancestor of the Hebrew race? This seems negatived by the fact that the Arabic root connected with the word “Hebrew” is 'Abar, not Habar.
They were living witnesses to the truth of Scripture, and could testify that they had made it known to the people; (Cf. 2:143, 4:135, and 5:8).
Two charges are made, against the Jews: (1) that even the books which they had, they twisted in meaning, to suit their own purposes, because they feared men rather than God: (2) that what they had was but fragments of the original Law given to Moses, mixed up with a lot of semi-historical and legendary matter, and some fine poetry. The Tawrah mentioned in the Qur-ān is not the Old Testament as we have it: nor is it even the Pentateuch (the first five books of the Old Testament, containing the Law embedded in a great deal of semi-historical and legendary narrative). See Appendix 2, on the Tawrah (printed at the end of this Sūra).