1. Ha Mım. Allah knows best what is meant by this.

2. By the Book (the Qur’an) which makes things clear – make s clear the path of guidance and the Sharı‘a rulings needed for it.

3. We have made it an Arabic Qur’an so that perhaps you, people of Makka, may use your intellect and understand its meanings.

4. It is in the Source Book with Us – the source of all divinely revealed Books, the Preserved Tablet; high-exalted over the Books before it, full of vast wisdom.

5. Shall We then deprive you of the Reminder – keep the Qur’an back from you so that you cannot command or prohibit by means of it – for being a profligate people (idolaters)? No!

6. How many Prophets We sent to the previous peoples!

7. But no Prophet came to them without their mocking him – previous Prophets were mocked as your people mock you. This is solace for the Prophet, may Allah bless him and grant him peace –

8. …and so We destroyed people with greater power than they have – who were more powerful than your people – and the pattern of the previous peoples has gone before. There are signs in the earlier peoples and how they were destroyed, and the end of your people will be like that.

9. If you were to ask them, ‘Who created the heavens and the earth?’ they would reply, ‘The Almighty, the All-Knowing created them.’ It is only Allah, who possesses the necessary might and knowledge. Allah adds:

10. It is He who made the earth a cradle for you – a comfortable berth for you as a cradle is for an infant – and made pathways for you in it so that perhaps you might be guided to your destinations when you travel.

11. It is He who sends down water in due measure from the sky – according to your need for it; He does not make it an overwhelming flood – by which We bring a dead land back to life. That is how you too will be brought back to life and will be brought forth from your graves alive.

12. It is He who created all species, and gave you ships and livestock – such as camels – for you to ride…

13. …so that you might sit firmly on their backs and remember your Lord’s blessing while you are seated on them, saying, ‘Glory be to Him who has subjected this to us and made it obey us. We could never have accomplished it by ourselves.

14. Indeed we are returning to our Lord!’

15. They have assigned to Him a portion of His creatures! This was done in saying, “The angels are the daughters of Allah” because the child is a portion of the father. The angels are the slaves of Allah. Truly man is openly ungrateful and clearly demonstrating unbelief.

16. Has He then taken daughters from what He has created and chosen sons for you? Do you say this? This is a sentence which negates what they have said.

17. When any of them is given the good news of the very thing which he himself has ascribed to the All-Merciful – in other words, when he is given the good news of a girl, which is like the daughters they ascribe to Him – his face darkens with sorrow and he is furious – filled with rage. Then how can he ascribe daughters to Allah?

18. ‘What! Do you attribute to Allah someone brought up among pretty trinkets and jewellery and who cannot produce a cogent argument – in her weakness!’

19. They have designated the angels as female, those who are in the presence of the All-Merciful! Were they present to witness their creation? Their testimony that the angels are female will be recorded and they will be asked about it in the Next World and will endure punishment on that account.

20. They say, ‘If the All-Merciful had so willed, we would not have worshipped them.’ If Allah had willed, they would not have wo rshipped the angels. They claim that they worship them by His will, which shows that He must be pleased with it. Allah responds: They have no knowledge of that – about His being pleased with the worship of those idols; they are only conjecturing. They lie and will suffer punishment on account of that.

21. Or did We give them a Book before (the Qur’an) which contains instructions to worship other than Allah and which they are holding to? No, that has not occurred.

22. No; in fact they say, ‘We found our fathers following a religion – the word umma, which normally means “community”, here means “religion” – and we are simply guided in their footsteps. They used to worship other than Allah and so we do too.’

23. Similarly We never sent any warner before you to any city without the affluent among them – those who were given blessings similar to those your people enjoy – saying, ‘We found our fathers following a religion and we are simply following in their footsteps.’

24. Say to them: ‘Do you follow that? What if I have come with better guidance than what you found your fathers following?’ They say, ‘We reject what you – and the Prophets before you have been sent with.’

25. Then Allah threatens them by saying: So We took revenge on them – meaning those who denied the Messengers before you. And see the final fate of the deniers!

26. Remember when Ibrhım said to his father and his people, ‘I am free of everything you worship…

27. …except for Him Who created me and brought me into being, Who will certainly guide me to His din,’

28. …he made it – the formula of taw˛ı∂, which is understood from his words, “I am going towards my Lord; He will be my guide” (37:99) – an ongoing word among his descendants – and there arethose who will continue to affirm the unity of Allah among them – so that perhaps they might turn back – so that the people of Makka may return from what they are doing to the din of Ibrahim, their ancestor.

29. I let those people (the idolaters) and their forefathers enjoy themselves – and did not bring on their punishment – until the truth (the Qur’an) came to them and a Messenger to make it clear – to show them the rulings of the Shari‘ a. That was Muhammad, may Allah bless him and grant him peace.

30. But when the truth (the Qur’an) came to them they said, ‘This is magic and we reject it.’

31. They say, ‘Why was this Qur’an not sent down to one of the great men of the two cities (Makka and Taif)?’ The men referred to were al-Walid ibn al-Mughira in Makka and ‘Urwa ibn Mas‘ud ath-Thaqafi in Taif.

32. Is it they, then who allocate the mercy – meaning Prophethood in this instance – of your Lord? We have allocated their livelihood among them in the life of this world – and made some of them wealthy and some of them poor – and raised some of them above others in rank by means of their wealth so that some of them are subservient to others by having to work for a wage because of their poverty. But the mercy of your Lord (the Garden) is better than anything they amass in this world.

33. Were it not that mankind might all become one community in unbelief We would have given those who reject the All-Merciful silver roofs (read as suqufan and saqfan) to their houses and silver stairways to ascend to the roof –

34. …and silver doors to their houses, and silver couches on which to recline,

35. …and gold ornaments. If it were not for the fear of unbelief mentioned, Allah would have given mankind those things because of the lack of importance of this world in His sight. All that is merely the trappings of the life of this world. But the Next World (the Garden) with your Lord is for those who are godfearing.

36. If someone shuts his eyes to the remembrance of the All- Merciful – turns away from the Qur’an – We assign him a shaytan who becomes his bosom friend and never leaves him –

37. … they (the shaytans) debar them (those who shut their eyes) from the path of guidance; yet they still think they are guided –

38. …until, when he (the one who shut his eyes ) reaches Us – together with his companion, on the Day of Rising – he says, ‘If only there were the distance of the two Easts between you and me!’ What an evil companion!

39. Allah says to such people: It (their wish and regret) will not benefit you (those who shut their eyes) today, since you did wrong – and their wrongdoing by associating others with Allah in this world will become clear to them, that you and your fellows share equally in the punishment – since nothing will help them.

40. Can you make the dead hear, or guide the blind and those who are patently misguided? This means that they will not believe.

41. Either We will extricate you and take revenge on them – Allah will make the Prophet die before He punishes them in this world, and they will then be punished in the Next World as well –

42. …or let you see what punishment We have promised them while you are still alive. They are completely in Our power.

43. So hold fast to what has been revealed to you (the Qur’an). You are on a straight path.

44. It is certainly a reminder – meaning “honour” in this instance – to you and to your people – since it was revealed in their language – and you will be questioned about fulfilling what it demands of you.

45. Ask those We sent before you as Our Messengers: have We ever designated any gods to be worshipped besides the All- Merciful? It is said that this is to be taken literally since the Messengers were gathered together with him on his Night Journey. It is also said that what is meant are their communities, the People of the two previous Scriptures. He did not actually ask anyone according to either view. What is meant by the command to ask is to tell the idolaters of Quraysh that no Messenger from Allah and no Book has brought the worship of anything other than Allah.

46. We sent Musa with Our Signs to Pharaoh and his nobles (the Copts). He said, ‘I am the Messenger of the Lord of the worlds.’

47. But when he came to them with Our Signs – which proved that He was a Messenger – they merely laughed at them.

48. We showed them no Sign of punishment, such as the flood which entered their houses, submerging those who were sitting down up to their necks for seven days, and the locusts, that was not greater than the one before it. We seized them with punishment so that perhaps they would turn back from unbelief

49. They said to Musa, when they saw the punishment: ‘Magician – the word for “magician” means “one with complete knowledge”, because they considered magic to be a great knowledge – invoke your Lord for us by the contract He has made with you – to remove the punishment from us if we believe – and we shall certainly follow the guidance and believe.’

50. But when We removed the punishment from them through the supplication of Musa they immediately broke their word – broke their agreement and persisted in their unbelief.

51. Pharaoh called to his people – in arrogant boastfulness – saying, ‘My people, does the kingdom of Egypt not belong to me? Do not all these rivers – referring to branches of the Nile – flow – under my palaces – under my control? Do you not then see my might?

52. Do you not see? Am I not better than this man (Musa) who is contemptible (weak and servile) and can scarcely make anything clear – in other words, cannot speak clearly because of the injury which occurred to his tongue, caused by a hot ember when he was a child?

53. Why have gold bracelets not been put upon his arms, if he is speaking the truth, since it was the custom of men at the time to wear gold bracelets and necklaces – and why is there not a train of angels accompanying him – successive ranks of angels which attest to his truthfulness?’

54. In that way he (Pharaoh) swayed his people and they succumbed to him – and they did what he wanted and denied Musa. They were a people of deviators.

55. Then when they had provoked Our wrath We took revenge on them and drowned every one of them.

56. We made them a thing of the past, an example for later peoples. They were a lesson for those after them so that they should not do the same as those before them did.

57. When an example is made of the son of Maryam, your people (the idolators) laugh uproariously at what they hear. When Allah revealed, “You and what you worship apart from Allah are fuel for Jahannam,” (21:98) the idolaters said, “We are content that our gods should be with Isa, because he was worshipped instead of Allah.”

58. They retort, ‘Who is better, then: our gods or him (Isa)?’ We are content that our gods should be compared to him.’ They only say this to you for argument’s sake. They are arguing knowingly using false premises since they know that their idols have no intelligence and so are nothing like Isa, peace be upon him. They are indeed a strongly disputatious people.

59. He (Isa) is only a slave on whom We bestowed Our blessing – the gift of Prophethood – and whom We made an example – by his coming into existence without a father – for the tribe of Israel – because the unusual nature of his birth is evidence of Allah’s power to do whatever He wills.

60. If We wished We could appoint angels in exchange for you and replace you – to succeed you on the earth – by destroying you.

61. He (Isa) is a Sign of the Last Hour because he will descend then; have no doubt about it (the Hour). Tell them: But follow me in affirming the unity of Allah. This – which I command you to do – is a straight path.

62. Do not let Shaytan bar your wa y – turn you from the din of Allah. He truly is an outright – clear – enemy to you.

63. And when Isa came with the Clear Signs – here meaning miracles and laws – he said, ‘I have come to you with Wisdom – meaning Prophethood and the laws of the Gospel – and to clarify for you some of the things about which you have differed regarding some of the rulings of the Torah about the din and other matters. Therefore be fearful of Allah and obey me.

64. Allah is my Lord and your Lord, so worship Him. This is a straight path.’

65. The various factions among them differed about Isa and whether he was God, the son of God, or part of a trinity. Woe (punishment), then, to those who did wrong by disbelieving as is shown by what they said about Isa – on account of the punishment of a painful Day!

66. What are they (the unbelievers of Makka) waiting for, but the Last Hour to come upon them suddenly when they are not expecting it to arrive?

67. On that Day the closest friends – people who were friends in disobedience to Allah in this world – will be enemies to one another on the Day of Resurrection, except for those who are godfearing – those who loved one another in Allah and in obedience to Him. They will be friends and the following will be said to them:

68. ‘My slaves, you will feel no fear today; you will know no sorrow.’

69. As for those who believed in Our Signs (the Qur’an) and became Muslims:

70. ‘Enter the Garden, you and your wives, delighting in your joy.’

71. Platters and cups – the word for “cups”, akwab, means drinking vessels without handles such that those who drink from them may do so from any side they wish – of gold will passed around among them; and they will have there all that their hearts desire and their eyes find delight in. ‘You will remain in it timelessly, for ever.

72. That is the Garden you will inherit for what you did.

73. There will be many varieties of fruits in it for you to eat.’

74. The evildoers will remain timelessly, for ever, in the punishment of Hell.

75. It will not be eased for them. They will be crushed there by despair. They will be dumb with despair.

76. We have not wronged them; it was they who were wrongdoers.

77. They will call out, ‘Malik, the angel in charge of the Fire, let your Lord put an end to us and allow us to die!’ He (Malik) will say – after a thousand years have passed – ‘You will stay the way you are – forever in the punishment.’

78. Allah says: We brought you the truth, people of Makka, on the tongue of the Messenger, but most of you hated the truth.

79. Or have they (the unbelievers of Makka) hatched a plot against the Prophet Muhammad? It is We who are the Plotter and will contrive their destruction.

80. Or do they imagine that We do not hear their secrets and their private talk? Their secrets are what they confide to others. and their private talk is what they say among themselves. On the contrary: Our messengers – meaning the angels who record the actions – are right there with them writing it down!

81. Say: ‘If the All-Merciful had a son I would be the first to worship him.’ It is not true, and it is confirmed that He has no child and hence no one else is worthy of worship.

82. Glory be to the Lord of the heavens and the earth, the Lord of the Throne, beyond what they describe – the lies they tell when they ascribe a child to Him.

83. So leave them to plunge – in their falsehoods – and play around – in this world – until they meet their Day (the Day of Rising) which they are promised, when the punishment will take place.

84. It is He who is God – the One who is worshipped – in heaven and God on earth. He is the All-Wise in managing His creation, the All-Knowing of the best interests of His creatures.

85. Blessed be Him to Whom belongs the sovereignty of the heavens and the earth and everything in between them. The knowledge of when the Hour will come is with Him. You will be returned (read as turja‘una and also yurja‘una, “They will be returned”) to Him.

86. Those you call upon and worship apart from Him – referring to the unbelievers – possess no power of intercession for anyone – only those who bore witness to the truth by saying, “There is no god but Allah” and have full knowledge in their hearts of what their tongues attest to. This means Isa, ‘Uzayr and the angels. They will intercede for the believers.

87. If you asked them who created them, they would say, ‘Allah!’ So how have they been perverted: turned away from worshipping Allah?

88. And as for your words – the words of Mu˛ammad, the Prophet, – ‘My Lord, these are people who do not believe!’

89. Allah says: Turn from them and say, ‘Peace – from us. This was before the command to fight them. They will soon come to know (read as ya‘lamuna and also ta‘lamuna, “you will come to know”).’