And we plunged into vain disputes with vain disputers,

And we rejected as a lie, the day of reckoning,

Till the certainty7 came upon us”-

And intercession of the interceders shall not avail them.

Then what hath come to them that they turn aside from the Warning

As if they were affrighted asses fleeing from a lion?

And every one of them would fain have open pages given to him out of Heaven.

It shall not be. They fear not the life to come.

It shall not be. For this Koran is warning enough. And whoso will, it
warneth him.

But not unless God please, shall they be warned. Meet is He to be feared.
Meet is forgiveness in Him.


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1 This Sura is placed by Muir in the “second stage” of Meccan Suras, and
twenty-first in chronological order, in the third or fourth year of the
Prophet’s career. According, however, to the chronological list of Suras
given by Weil (Leben M. p. 364) from ancient tradition, as well as from the
consentient voice of tradionists and commentaries (v. Nöld. Geschichte, p.