Those who set up partners will say, "If God wished, we would not have set up partners, nor would have our fathers, nor would we have forbidden anything." Those before them lied in the same way, until they tasted Our might. Say, "Do you have any knowledge to bring out to us? You only follow conjecture, you only guess."
Translation endnotes
[6:148] Fabricating prohibitions and attributing them to God through his messenger is shirk, that is associating partners with God. Modern mushriks, like their predecessors, accuse God for their commitment of shirk. The portrait of mushriks drawn by the Quran is universal. See 3:18; 6:22-24; 16:35; 10:59-60.