At-Tur

By the Mount, that is, the [name of the] mountain on which God spoke to Moses,

and an inscribed Book,

on an unrolled parchment, that is, the Torah or the Qur’ān.

By the [greatly] frequented House — which is [located] in the third, or the sixth or the seventh heaven, directly above the Ka‘ba; it is visited every day by seventy thousand angels, circumambulating it and performing prayers [around it], and never returning to it;

and the raised roof, that is to say, the heaven,

and the swarming sea: that is to say, the one that is filled:

lo! your Lord’s chastisement will assuredly take place, it will assuredly come down on those who deserve it;

there is none that can avert it, from such [a deserving one].

On the day (yawma is operated by la-wāqi‘un, ‘will assuredly take place’) when the heaven will heave with a great heaving, [when it will] move and spin,

and the mountains move with a great motion, becoming scattered dust, this is the Day of Resurrection.

Woe then, terrible chastisement [will come], on that day to the deniers, of the messengers,

those who play around in vain talk, [in] falsehood, that is to say, those who are busily engaged with their disbelief;

the day when they will be thrust with a violent thrust into Hell, [when] they will be pushed violently (this [last clause, yawma yuda‘‘ūna ilā nāri jahannama da‘‘an] is a substitution for yawma tamūru, ‘the day when [the heaven] will heave’) and it will be said to them in reproach:

‘This is the Fire which you used to deny!

Is this then sorcery, [this] chastisement that you see — as you were wont to say about the revelation, that it was sorcery — or is it that you do not see?

Burn in it! And whether you endure, it, or do not endure, your endurance and your anguish, will be the same for you, because your endurance will be of no use to you. You are only being requited for what you used to do’, that is to say, [only] the requital for it.

Truly the God-fearing will be amid gardens and bliss,

rejoicing, delighting, in what (bi-mā relates to the verbal action) their Lord has given them, and [that] their Lord has shielded them from the chastisement of Hell-fire (wa-waqāhum rabbuhum ‘adhāba’l-jahīmi is a supplement to ātāhum, ‘[what He] has given them’, in other words, [rejoicing] in their having been given [this reward] and shielded [from Hell-fire]).

And it will said to them: ‘Eat and drink in full enjoyment (hanī’an is a circumstantial qualifier, that is to say, muhanna’īna) [as a reward] for what (bi-mā: the bi- is causative) you used to do’.

[They will be] reclining (muttaki’īna is a circumstantial qualifier referring to the concealed subject of God’s words fī jannātin, ‘amid gardens’) on ranged couches, [arranged] one next to the other, and We will wed them (zawwajnāhum is a supplement to jannātin, ‘gardens’, meaning ‘We will couple them’) to beautiful houris, of wide and beautiful eyes.

And those who believed (wa’lladhīna āmanū, the subject) and whom We made to be followed (wa-atba‘nāhum: a variant reading has wa’ttaba‘athum, ‘and there followed them’, as a supplement to āmanū, ‘who believed’) by their descendants (dhurrīyātihim: a variant reading [for this plural] has dhurrīyatuhum), young and old, in faith, on the part of the older ones and on the part of the parents in [their] young ones (the predicate [of the subject above] is [the following, alhaqnā bihim), We will make their, mentioned, descendants join them, in Paradise, so that they are in the same degree [of reward], even though they might not have performed the same [meritorious] deeds as them [to deserve this equal status], a way of honouring the parents by having their children join them [again]; and We will not deprive them (read alatnāhum or alitnāhum), [We will not] diminish [them], of anything (min shay’in: min is extra) of their deeds, in order to add it to the deeds of their children. Every man is subject to what he has earned, of good or evil deeds, and will be requited for evil and rewarded for good.

And We will supply them, We will enhance for them [their provision], from time to time, with fruits and meat, such as they desire, even if they do not request it openly.

They will pass from one to another therein, in Paradise, a cup, [of] wine, wherein is neither vain talk, which might come about between them as a result of drinking it, nor cause for sin, thereby, that might befall them — in contrast to [the case with] the wine of this world.

And there will circulate from all around them, for service, youths, delicate [in demeanour], of their own, as if, in terms of their beauty and immaculateness, they were hidden pearls, preserved inside shells, because when it [a pearl] is inside it, it is better than one that is not.

And some among them will turn to one another, questioning each other — they ask one another about how they were in the past and what they have now attained, in their delight and acknowledgement of the grace [of God to them].

They say, as an intimation of the reason for this attainment: ‘Truly, before, amid our families, in the world, we used to be ever anxious, afraid of God’s chastisement;

but God showed us favour, through [His] forgiveness, and shielded us from the piercing chastisement (al-samūm), the Fire, so called because it penetrates the pores (al-masāmm); and they say, also by way of intimation:

indeed before, that is, in the world, we used to call on Him, worship Him, affirming His Oneness. Verily He is (read innahu as the beginning of a new [independent] sentence, even if it introduces the reason in terms of its import; or read annahu as a reason in terms of the [syntactical] order of the words) the Benign, the Beneficent, the True to His promise, the Merciful, One of tremendous mercy.

So remind, persist in reminding the idolaters and do not desist [from this] even if they say to you that you are a soothsayer or a madman. For by the grace of your Lord, by His bestowal of grace on you, you are neither soothsayer (bi-kāhinin is the predicate of mā) nor madman (wa-lā majnūnin, a supplement to it).

Or (am means bal) do they say, that he is: ‘A poet, for whom we may await the accidents of fate?’, the vicissitudes of time, so that he will just die like other poets.

Say: ‘Await!, my death. For I too will be with you awaiting’, your death. They were then chastised with [death by] the sword on the day of Badr.

Or do their faculties of understanding prompt them to [say] this?, their saying to him: [you are either] a sorcerer, a poet, a soothsayer or a madman, in other words, they do not [in reality] prompt them to [say] this. Or (am, [in effect] means bal, ‘rather’) are they a rebellious lot?, because of their obstinacy.

Or do they say, ‘He has improvised it?’, he has concocted the Qur’ān. He has not concocted it; Rather they do not believe, out of arrogance. If they [continue to] say that he has concocted it:

Then let them bring a, concocted, discourse like it, if they are truthful, in what they say.

Or were they created out of nothing?, [that is] without a Creator. Or are they the creators?, of themselves. It makes no sense for a created thing to have no creator, nor can a thing that will cease to existent [have the power to] create. There must be a Creator of them, and that is God, the One, so why do they not affirm His Oneness and believe in His Messenger and His Book?

Or did they create the heavens and the earth? Nor can any but God, the Creator, have created them, so why do they not worship Him? Nay, but they are not certain, of Him, for otherwise they would have believed in His Prophet.

Or do they possess the treasuries of your Lord?, in the way of prophethood, provision and other matters, so that they are able to assign what they will exclusively to whom they will? Or are they the ones in control?, [or] are they the mighty ones who hold sway? (the verb [from musaytirūna] is saytara, similar [in root form] to baytara, ‘to practice veterinary medicine’, or bayqara, ‘to corrupt’, ‘to ruin’).

Or do they have a ladder, a means of ascension into the heaven, whereby they eavesdrop?, that is, at the top of which [they listen in], on the conversations of the angels, so that they are then able to dispute with the Prophet, as they claim. If that is what they assert: Then let their eavesdropper, [let] the one claiming to be able to listen [in on their conversations] on top of this [ladder], produce a manifest warrant, a plain and evident proof. Now, on account of the similarity of this assertion to their assertion that the angels are the daughters of God, He, exalted be He, says:

Or does He have daughters, as you claim, whereas you have sons? Exalted be God above what you claim!

Or are you asking them for a fee, a wage in return for what you have brought them in the way of religion, so that they are weighed down with debt?, [with] the liability for this, so that they are unable to submit [to God].

Or do they have [access to] the Unseen, that is, the knowledge of it, so that they can write it down?, and are hence able to dispute with the Prophet (s) regarding the Resurrection and the matters relating to the Hereafter, as they claim.

Or do they desire to outmanoeuvre?, you and have you killed, at the Assembly Council. But those who disbelieve, they are the outmanoeuvred ones!, the vanquished and the ones destroyed. God preserved him from them and then destroyed them at Badr.

Or do they have a god other than God? Glory be to God [exalted is He] above any partners that they may ascribe!, to Him in the way of gods (the succession of interrogatives with am, ‘or’, are intended to express censure and rebuke).

And if they were to see a fragment, a portion, of the heaven falling, on them — as they say, Then make fragments of the heaven fall upon us [Q. 26:187], as a chastisement for them — they would say, this is: ‘A heap of clouds!’, piled on top of one another, that will bring us water; and so they do not believe.

So leave them until they encounter that day of theirs in which they will be thunderstruck, [in which] they will die;

the day when their guile will avail them nothing (yawma lā yughnī is a substitution for yawmahumu, ‘that day of theirs’) and they will not be helped, they will [not] be protected from the chastisement in the Hereafter.

And assuredly for those who do wrong, by their [persistence in] disbelief, there is a chastisement beyond that, in this world, before their death — thus they were punished with famine and drought for seven years, and with being killed on the day of Badr; but most of them do not know, that the chastisement will befall them.

And submit patiently to the judgement of your Lord, that they be reprieved, and do not be grieved, for surely you fare before Our eyes, [you are] in Our sight, We see you and preserve you. And glorify, continuously, with praise of your Lord, that is to say, say subhāna’Llāhi wa bi-hamdihi, ‘Glory, and praise, be to God!’, when you rise, from your sleeping-place or your sitting-place,

and glorify Him at night — also in actual [utterance] — and at the receding of the stars (idbāra is a verbal noun), that is to say, also glorify Him after these have set; or [it means] in the case of the former, perform the two evening prayers, and in the case of the latter, the two units (rak‘a) of the dawn prayer, or — it is said — the morning prayer.