[2:76-7] And when they meet those who believe, they say, 'We believe'; but when they go in private one to another, they say: 'Do you speak to them of what God has disclosed to you, so that they may thereby dispute with you before your Lord? Have you no understanding?' * Know they not that God knows what they keep secret and what they proclaim?
They encouraged one another amongst themselves to reject the Real and to hide the situation from the Muslims. But they did not know that God was informing His Messenger (ʿa) of their secrets, and that a light the Real has made manifest is not extinguished by the efforts of any other than Him. When the tongue agrees but the mind objects, it only increases separation.