Just, now, is our sentence2 against most of them; therefore they shall not believe.

On their necks have we placed chains which reach the chin, and forced up are their heads: 

Before them have we set a barrier and behind them a barrier, and we have shrouded them in a veil, so that they shall not see.

Alike is it to them if thou warn them or warn them not:  they will not believe.

Him only shalt thou really warn, who followeth the monition and feareth the God of mercy in secret:  him cheer with tidings of pardon, and of a noble recompense.

Verily, it is We who will quicken the dead, and write down the works which they have sent on before them, and the traces which they shall have left behind them:  and everything have we set down in the clear Book of our decrees.3

Set forth to them the instance of the people of the city4 when the Sent Ones came to it.

When we sent two unto them and they charged them both with imposture-therefore with a third we strengthened them:  and they said, “Verily we are the Sent unto you of God.”

They said, “Ye are only men like us:  Nought hath the God of Mercy sent down.  Ye do nothing but lie.”

They said, “Our Lord knoweth that we are surely sent unto you;

To proclaim a clear message is our only duty.”

They said, “Of a truth we augur ill from you:5 if ye desist not we will surely stone you, and a grievous punishment will surely befall you from us.”

They said, “Your augury of ill is with yourselves.  Will ye be warned?6 Nay, ye are an erring people.”

Then from the end of the city a man came running:7 He said, “O my people! follow the Sent Ones;

Follow those who ask not of you a recompense, and who are rightly guided.

And why should I not worship Him who made me, and to whom ye shall be brought back?

Shall I take gods beside Him?  If the God of Mercy be pleased to afflict me, their intercession will not avert from me aught, nor will they deliver: 

Truly then should I be in a manifest error.

Verily, in your Lord have I believed; therefore hear me."8

-It was said to him, “Enter thou into Paradise:”  And he said, “Oh that my people knew

How gracious God hath been to me, and that He hath made me one of His honoured ones.”

But no army sent we down out of heaven after his death, nor were we then sending down our angels-

There was but one shout from Gabriel, and lo! they were extinct.

Oh! the misery that rests upon my servants!  No apostle cometh to them but they laugh him to scorn.

See they not how many generations we have destroyed before them?

Not to false gods is it that they shall be brought9 back,

But all, gathered together, shall be set before Us.

Moreover, the dead earth is a sign to them:  we quicken it and bring forth the grain from it, and they eat thereof: