Аль Имран 3:176–200

Let them not grieve you (read yuhzinka, or yahzunka from [1st form] hazanahu, ‘he made him grieve’, an alternative expression to [4th form] ahzanahu, ‘he made him grieve’) those that vie with one another in unbelief, succumbing to it promptly by supporting it, namely, the Meccans or the hypocrites: in other words, do not be concerned for their unbelief; they will not hurt God at all, by their actions, only hurting themselves. God desires not to assign them any portion, any lot, in the Hereafter, that is, in Paradise, and that is why God forsook them; and theirs is a mighty chastisement, in the Fire.

Those who purchase unbelief at the price of faith, that is, taking it in place of it, they will not hurt God at all, with their unbelief, and there awaits them a painful chastisement (alīm means mu’lim, ‘painful’).

And let not the disbelievers suppose (read lā yahsabanna, ‘let them not suppose’, or lā tahsabanna, ‘do not suppose’) that what We indulge them in, that is, [that] Our indulging [them], in extending their [terms of] life and deferring them [their death], is better for their souls (in the case of the reading yahsabanna, ‘let them [not] suppose’, anna [of anna-mā] and its two operators stand in place of the two objects, but only in place of the second in the case of the other reading [tahsabanna], ‘do [not] suppose’). We grant them indulgence, We give [them] respite, only that they may increase in sinfulness, through frequent disobedience, and theirs is a humbling chastisement, one of humiliation, in the Hereafter.

It is not God’s purpose to leave, to abandon, the believers in the state in which you, O people, are, where the sincere are intermingled with those otherwise, till He shall distinguish (read yamīza or yumayyiza), [till] He separates, the evil one, the hypocrite, from the good, the believer, through the burdensome obligations that will reveal this [distinction] — He did this on the Day of Uhud. And it is not God’s purpose to apprise you of the Unseen, so that you could recognise the hypocrites from the others, before the distinguishing; but God chooses, He selects, of His messengers whom He will, apprising him of [some of] His Unseen, as when He apprised the Prophet (s) of the position of the hypocrites. So believe in God and His messengers; and if you believe and guard against, hypocrisy, then yours shall be a great wage.

Let them not suppose (read lā yahsabanna, ‘let them not suppose’, or lā tahsabanna, ‘do not suppose’) those who are niggardly with what God has given them of His bounty, that is, with His obligatory almsgiving, that it, their niggardliness, is better for them (khayrun lahum, is the second direct object; the pronoun [huwa, ‘[that] it is’] is used to separate [the two statements]; the first [direct object] is bukhlahum ‘their niggardliness’ implicit before the relative clause [alladhīna] in the case of the reading tahsabanna [sc. wa-lā tahsabanna bukhlahum, ‘do not suppose their niggardliness…’], or before the pronoun [huwa, ‘it is’] in the case of the reading yahsabanna [sc. wa-lā yahsabanna lladhīna…bukhlahum huwa khayran lahum, ‘let them not suppose, those who…that their niggardliness is better for them’]); nay, it is worse for them; what they were niggardly with, namely, the obligatory almsgiving of their wealth, they shall have hung around their necks on the Day of Resurrection, when he will have a snake around his neck biting viciously at him, as reported in a hadīth; and to God belongs the inheritance of the heavens and the earth, inheriting them after the annihilation of their inhabitants. And God is aware of what you do (ta‘malūna, also read ya‘malūna, ‘they do’), and will requite you for it.

Verily God has heard the saying of those, namely the Jews, who said, ‘Indeed God is poor, and we are rich’: they said this when the verse, who is he that will lend God a good loan [Q. 2:245] was revealed, adding that, ‘If God were [truly] rich, He would not be asking us for loans’. We shall write down, We shall order that it be written, what they have said, in the scrolls containing their deeds so that they will be requited for it (a variant reading [for active naktubu, ‘We shall write’] has the passive yuktabu, ‘it shall be written’) and, We shall write down, their slaying (read accusative qatlahum or nominative qatluhum) the prophets without right, and We shall say (naqūlu, also read yaqūlu, meaning God [shall say]) to them by the tongue of the angels in the Hereafter, ‘Taste the chastisement of the Burning, the Fire.

When they are thrown into [the Fire], it will be said to them: That, punishment, is for what your hands have sent before: ‘hands’ are used to designate a human being because most actions are performed with them; for God is never unjust towards His servants’, punishing them without them having sinned.

Those (alladhīna, an adjectival qualification of the previous alladhīna, ‘those who’ [Q. 3:181]) same who said, to Muhammad (s), ‘God has already made covenant with us, in the Torah, that we should not believe in any messenger, accepting his truthfulness, until he bring us an offering to be devoured by fire’, and so we will not believe in you until you bring us this [offering], namely, of grazing livestock or other [kind of animal] one offers [in sacrifice] to God. If it is accepted, a white fire will come down from the heaven and consume it, otherwise it will remain as it is. Such a covenant was made with the Children of Israel, but not in the case of Jesus and Muhammad. God, exalted be He, says, Say, to them in rebuke: ‘messengers have come to you before me with clear proofs, with miracles, and with that which you said, [messengers] such as Zachariah and John, but you slew them: the address here is for those living at the time of our Prophet Muhammad (s), even though the deed was their forefathers’, for they [their descendants] are content with it. Why did you slay them, then, if you are truthful?’, about [the fact] that you would believe if it [the offering] were brought [to you].

But if they deny you, so were denied messengers before you who came bearing clear proofs, miracles, and the Scriptures, such as the scrolls of Abraham, and the Illuminating, the lucid, Book, that is, the Torah and the Gospel (a variant reading establishes the [prefixed preposition] bā’ in both [words, sc. bi’l-zubur wa-bi’l-kitāb l-munīr, ‘with the Scriptures and with the Illuminating Book’]), so be patient as they were.

Every soul shall taste of death; you shall surely be paid in full your wages, the requital of your deeds, on the Day of Resurrection. Whoever is moved away, distanced, from the Fire and admitted to Paradise, will have triumphed, he will have attained his ultimate wish. Living in, the life of this world is but the comfort of delusion; of inanity, enjoyed for a little while, then perishing.

You shall surely be tried (la-tublawunna, the [final] nūn nominative indicator has been omitted because two nūn letters [would otherwise] succeed one another, as has been the plural person indicator wāw where two unvocalised consonants have come together), in other words, you shall surely be tested, in your property, through the duties [imposed] thereupon and through the damages that affect them; and in your selves, through [the obligations of] worship and through calamities, and you shall hear from those who were given the Scripture before you, the Jews and the Christians, and from those who are idolaters, from among the Arabs, much hurt, in the way of insult, slander and [their] flirting with your women; but if you are patient, through this, and fear, God — surely that is true resolve, that is, it is one of those things regarding which one must necessarily have firm resolve.

And, mention, when God made covenant with those who had been given the Scripture, that is, the pledge [taken] from them in the Torah, ‘You shall expound it (read tubayyinunnahu, or yubayyinunnahu, ‘they shall expound it’) the Book, to people, and not conceal it’ (read taktumūnahu, ‘you shall not conceal it’, or yaktumūnahu, ‘they shall not conceal it’). But they rejected it, they discarded the covenant, behind their backs, and so they did not act in accordance with it, and bought with it, they took in its place, a small price, of this world from the debased among them, enjoying supremacy over them in knowledge, and they concealed it, lest it [the supremacy] escape them; how evil is what they have bought, [how evil is] this purchase of theirs!

Do not reckon that (lā tahsabanna, or read lā yahsabanna, ‘let them not reckon’) those who rejoice in what they have brought, that is, [in what] they have done by leading people astray, and who love to be praised for what they have not done, in the way of adherence to the truth, being [themselves] misguided — do not reckon them (fa-lā tahsabannahum, is for emphasis [in the case of both readings above]) secure, in a place where they can escape, from the chastisement, in the Hereafter; but instead they shall be in a place of wherein they shall be tortured, and that is Hell; there shall be a painful chastisement for them, in it (alīm means mu’lim, ‘painful’). (If one reads yahsabanna, ‘let them [not] reckon’, the two direct objects of the first h-s-b verb would be indicated by the two direct objects of the second h-s-b verb; but if one reads tahsabanna, ‘do [not] reckon’, then only second direct object would be omitted).

To God belongs the kingdom of the heavens and of the earth, the storehouses of rain, sustenance, vegetation and so forth, and God has power over all things, including the punishing of disbelievers and the saving of believers.

Surely in the creation of the heavens and the earth, and the marvels contained in them, and in the alternation of night and day, coming and going, increasing and diminishing, there are signs, indications of God’s power, for people of pith, for people possessing intellects.

Those who (alladhīna, an adjectival qualification of the preceding [li-ūlī l-albāb, ‘for people of pith’], or a substitution for it) remember God, standing and sitting and on their sides, reclining, that is to say, in all states: [it is reported] from Ibn ‘Abbās that they perform prayer in these ways, [each] according to [his own] capacity; and reflect upon the creation of the heavens and the earth, to deduce therefrom the power of their Creator, saying: ‘Our Lord, You have not created this, creation that we see, in vain (bātilan, a circumstantial qualifier), frivolously, but as a proof of the totality of Your power. Glory be to You!, exalted above any frivolity. So guard us against the chastisement of the Fire.

Our Lord, whomever You admit into the Fire, to abide therein, You will have abased, You will have humiliated, and the evildoers, the disbelievers therein, shall have no helpers, to protect them from God’s chastisement, exalted be He (the overt noun [‘the evildoers’] has replaced the pronominalisation [‘whomever’] in order to inform that the [punishment of] abasement is specifically theirs; the min of [min ansār, ‘helpers’] is extra).

Our Lord, we have heard a caller calling, summoning people, to belief (li’l-īmān means ilā l-īmān) and this is Muhammad (s), or [summoning them] to the Qur’ān, saying, that, “Believe in your Lord!” And we believed, in Him. So, our Lord, forgive us our sins and absolve us of, conceal, our evil deeds, and so do not make them manifest by punishing us for them, and take us [in death], receive our spirits together, with the pious, the prophets and the righteous.

Our Lord, grant us what You have promised us through, the tongues of, Your messengers, in the way of mercy and favour: they are asking Him that they be made among those that deserve such a promise, for, God’s promise is fufilled regardless, but they are not certain that they are among those who deserve it. The repetition of the phrase, our Lord, is out of extreme humility; and abase us not on the Day of Resurrection. You will not fail the tryst’, the promise of Resurrection and Requital.

And their Lord answers them, their supplication, by saying that, ‘I do not let the labour of any labourer among you go to waste, be you male or female — the one of you is as the other (this statement is a reaffirmation of the previous one): that is, they are both equal when it comes to recompensing them for their deeds and for not neglecting them. When Umm Salama asked, ‘O Messenger of God, why is there no mention of women when it comes to the Emigration (hijra)?’, the following was revealed: and those who emigrated, from Mecca to Medina, and were expelled from their habitations, those who suffered hurt in My way, for My religion, and fought, the disbelievers, and were slain (read qutilū or quttilū) — them I shall surely absolve of their evil deeds, concealing these with forgiveness, and I shall admit them to Gardens underneath which river flow’. A reward (thawāban is a verbal noun reaffirming the import of la-ukaffiranna) from God! (there is a shift of person here). And God — with Him is the fairest reward, [the fairest] requital.

When the Muslims began to say, ‘Look at the enemies of God, how comfortable they are, while we are struggling!’, the following was revealed: Let it not delude you, that the disbelievers go to and fro in the land, engaging in commerce and acquiring profit:

That is [but], a little enjoyment, which they enjoy for a short while in this world and then perishes; then their abode is Hell — an evil cradling, [an evil] resting place it is!

But those who fear their Lord — for them shall be Gardens underneath which rivers flow, abiding, that is, it is decreed for them to abide, therein; a hospitality (nuzul is what is prepared for a guest; it is in the accusative [nuzulan] because it is a circumstantial qualifier referring to jannāt, ‘gardens’, and its operator is the import of the adverbial phrase) from God Himself. That which is with God, in the way of reward, is better for the pious, than the enjoyment of this world.

Verily, there are some among the People of the Scripture who believe in God, like ‘Abd Allāh b. Salām and his companions and the Negus, and what has been revealed to you, that is, the Qur’ān, and what has been revealed to them, that is, the Torah and the Gospel, humble before God (khāshi‘īn is a circumstantial qualification of the person of [the verb] yu’min, ‘who believe’, and takes into account the [potentially plural] sense of man, ‘who’), not purchasing with the verses of God, which they have before them in the Torah and the Gospel pertaining to the descriptions of the Prophet (s), a small price, of this world, by concealing them for fear of losing their supremacy, as others, like the Jews, have done. Those — their wage, the reward for their deeds, is with their Lord, [a reward] which they will be given twice over, as [stated] in the sūrat al-Qasas [Q. 28:54]. God is swift at reckoning, reckoning with the whole of creation in about half a day of the days of this world.

O you who believe, be patient, in [performing] acts of obedience, in the face of afflictions and in refraining from acts of disobedience, and vie in patience, with the disbelievers, lest they be more patient than you; be steadfast, persist in the struggle; fear God, in all of your circumstances, so that you will prosper, [so that] you will win [admittance to] Paradise and be delivered from the Fire.