The Quran

Preface

يا أَيُّهَا الَّذينَ آمَنُوا اتَّقُوا اللَّهَ وَآمِنوا بِرَسولِهِ يُؤتِكُم كِفلَينِ مِن رَحمَتِهِ وَيَجعَل لَكُم نورًا تَمشونَ بِهِ وَيَغفِر لَكُم ۚ وَاللَّهُ غَفورٌ رَحيمٌ

Yusuf Ali

O ye that believe!¹ Fear God, and believe in His Messenger, and He will bestow on you a double² portion of His Mercy: He will provide for you a Light by which ye³ shall walk (straight in your path), and He will forgive you (your past):⁴ for God is Oft-Forgiving, Most Merciful.

From the context before (see n. 5323 above) and after (see next note). this is held to refer to the Christians and People of the Book who kept their Faith true and undefiled.
The double portion refers to the past and the future. As noted in the last note, this passage is addressed to the Christians and the People of the Book, who, when honestly facing the question of the new Revelation in Islam, find in it the fulfilment of previous revelations, and therefore believe in God’s Messenger Muḥammad, and walk by the new Light. Their previous merits will be duly recognised, and they will be treated on fully equal terms in the new Ummah. This is their double share, not necessarily more in quantity than that of their brethren in Islam who passed through no other gate, but having a twofold aspect.
As this refers to the Christians and the People of the Book, the following saying of Christ in his last days may interest them: “Yet a little while is the light with you. Walk while ye have the light, lest darkness come upon you . . . While ye have the light, believe in the light, that ye may be the children of light. These things spake Jesus, and departed, and did hide himself from them”. (John, 12:35-36). The light of Christ’s Gospel soon departed; his Church was enveloped in darkness; then came the light again, in the fuller light of Islam. And they are asked to believe in the Light, and to walk in it. Cf. also 57:12, and n. 5288 above.
Any wrongs they may have committed through ignorance or misconceptions in their previous religion will be forgiven them, as they have seen the new Light and walk by it.