Say:  As to those who are in error, the God of Mercy will lengthen out to them a length of days

Until they see that with which they are threatened, whether it be some present chastisement, or whether it be “the Hour,” and they shall then know which is in the worse state, and which the more weak in forces: 

But God will increase the guidance of the already guided.

And good works which abide, are in thy Lord’s sight better in respect of guerdon, and better in the issue than all worldly good.

Hast thou marked him who believeth not in our signs, and saith, “I shall surely have riches and children bestowed upon me?”

Hath he mounted up into the secrets of God?  Hath he made a compact with the God of Mercy?

No! we will certainly write down what he saith, and will lengthen the length of his chastisement: 

And we will inherit what he spake of, and he shall come before us all alone.

They have taken other gods beside God to be their help.27

But it shall not be.  Those gods will disavow their worship and will become their enemies.

Seest thou not that we send the Satans against the Infidels to urge them into sin?

Wherefore be not thou in haste with them;28 for a small number of days do we number to them.

One day we will gather the God-fearing before the God of Mercy with honours due:29

But the sinners will we drive unto Hell, like flocks driven to the watering.

None shall have power to intercede, save he who hath received permission at the hands of the God of Mercy.

They say:  “The God of Mercy hath gotten offspring.”  Now have ye done a monstrous thing!

Almost might the very Heavens be rent thereat, and the Earth cleave asunder, and the mountains fall down in fragments,

That they ascribe a son to the God of Mercy, when it beseemeth not the God of Mercy to beget a son!

Verily there is none in the Heavens and in the Earth but shall approach the God of Mercy as a servant.  He hath taken note of them, and numbered them with exact numbering: 

And each of them shall come to Him, on the day of Resurrection, singly: 

But love will the God of Mercy vouchsafe to those who believe and do the things that be right.

Verily we have made this Koran easy and in thine own tongue, that thou mayest announce glad tidings by it to the God-fearing, and that thou mayest warn the contentious by it.

How many generations have we destroyed before them!  Canst thou search out one of them? or canst thou hear a whisper from them?

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1 Comp. the first 37 verses of this Sura with Sura iii. 35-57 with reference to the different style adopted by Muhammad in the later Suras, probably for the purpose of avoiding the imputation of his being merely a poet, a sorcerer, or person possessed.  Sura lii. 29, 30; xxi. 5; lxviii. 2, 51.  This Sura is one of the fullest and earliest Koranic Gospel Histories, and was recited to the Nagash or King of Æthiopia, in the presence of the ambassadors of the Koreisch.  His. 220; Caussin, i. 392; Sprenger (Life of M.) p. 193.