Hizb 21

The blame lies only on those who ask leave of you [to stay behind] though they are well-off. They are pleased to be with those who stay back; Allah has set a seal on their hearts, so they do not know [the outcome of their conduct].

They will offer you excuses when you return to them. Say, ‘Do not make excuses; we will never believe you. Allah has informed us of your state of affairs. Allah and His Apostle will observe your conduct, then you will be returned to the Knower of the sensible and the Unseen, and He will inform you concerning what you used to do.’

They will swear to you by Allah when you return to them, that you may leave them alone. So leave them alone. They are indeed filth, and their refuge shall be hell, a requital for what they used to earn.

They swear to you that you may be reconciled to them. But even if you are reconciled to them, Allah shall not be reconciled to the transgressing lot.

The Bedouins are more obdurate in unfaith and hypocrisy, and more apt to be ignorant of the precepts that Allah has sent down to His Apostle, and Allah is all-knowing, all-wise.

Among the Bedouins are those who regard what they spend as a loss, and they watch for a reversal of your fortunes. Theirs shall be an adverse turn of fortune, and Allah is all-hearing, all-knowing.

Yet among the Bedouins are [also] those who believe in Allah and the Last Day, and regard what they spend as [a means of attaining] nearness to Allah and the blessings of the Apostle. Now, it shall indeed bring them nearness, and Allah will admit them into His mercy. Indeed Allah is all-forgiving, all-merciful.

The early vanguard of the Emigrants and the Helpers and those who followed them in virtue—Allah is pleased with them and they are pleased with Him, and He has prepared for them gardens with streams running in them, to remain in them forever. That is the great success.

There are hypocrites among the Bedouins around you and among the townspeople of Madinah, steeped in hypocrisy. You do not know them; We know them, and We will punish them twice, then they shall be consigned to a great punishment.

[There are] others who have confessed to their sins, having mixed up righteous conduct with other that was evil. Maybe Allah will accept their repentance. Indeed Allah is all-forgiving, all-merciful.

Take charity from their possessions to cleanse them and purify them thereby, and bless them. Indeed your blessing is a comfort to them, and Allah is all-hearing, all-knowing.

Do they not know that it is Allah who accepts the repentance of His servants and receives the charities, and that it is Allah who is the All-clement, the All-merciful?

And say, ‘Go on working: Allah will see your conduct, and His Apostle and the faithful [as well], and you will be returned to the Knower of the sensible and the Unseen, and He will inform you concerning what you used to do.

[There are] others waiting Allah’s edict: either He shall punish them, or turn to them clemently, and Allah is all-knowing, all-wise.

As for those who took to a mosque for sabotage and for defiance, and to cause division among the faithful, and for the purpose of ambush [used] by those who have fought Allah and His Apostle before—they will surely swear, ‘We desired nothing but good,’ and Allah bears witness that they are indeed liars.

Do not stand in it ever! A mosque founded on Godwariness from the [very] first day is worthier that you stand in it [for prayer]. Therein are men who love to keep pure, and Allah loves those who keep pure.

Is he who founds his building on Godwariness and [the pursuit of Allah’s] pleasure better-off or he who founds his building on the brink of a collapsing bank which collapses with him into the fire of hell? Allah does not guide the wrongdoing lot.

The building they have built will never cease to be [a source of] disquiet in their hearts until their hearts are cut into pieces, and Allah is all-knowing, all-wise.

Indeed Allah has bought from the faithful their souls and their possessions for paradise to be theirs: they fight in the way of Allah, kill, and are killed. A promise binding upon Him in the Torah and the Evangel and the Quran. And who is truer to his promise than Allah? So rejoice in the bargain you have made with Him, and that is the great success.

[The faithful are] penitent, devout, celebrators of Allah’s praise, wayfarers, who bow [and] prostrate [in prayer], bid what is right and forbid what is wrong, and keep Allah’s bounds—and give good news to the faithful.

The Prophet and the faithful may not plead for the forgiveness of the polytheists, even if they should be [their] relatives, after it has become clear to them that they will be the inmates of hell.

Abraham’s pleading forgiveness for his father was only to fulfill a promise he had made him. So when it became manifest to him that he was an enemy of God, he repudiated him. Indeed Abraham was most plaintive and forbearing.

Allah does not lead any people astray after He has guided them until He has made clear to them what they should beware of. Indeed Allah has knowledge of all things.

Indeed to Allah belongs the kingdom of the heavens and the earth. He gives life and brings death. And besides Allah you do not have any guardian or helper.

Certainly Allah turned clemently to the Prophet and the Emigrants and the Helpers, who followed him in the hour of difficulty, after the hearts of a part of them were about to swerve. Then He turned clemently to them—indeed, He is most kind and merciful to them

—and to the three who were left behind. When the earth became narrow for them with [all] its expanse, and their own souls weighed heavily on them, and they knew that there was no refuge from Allah except in Him, then He turned clemently toward them so that they might be penitent. Indeed Allah is the All-clement, the All-merciful.

O you who have faith! Be wary of Allah, and be with the Truthful.

It is not fitting for the people of Madinah and the Bedouins around them to hang back behind the Apostle of Allah and prefer their own lives to his life. That is because they neither experience any thirst, nor fatigue, nor hunger, in the way of Allah, nor do they tread any ground enraging the faithless, nor do they gain any ground against an enemy but a righteous deed is written for them on its account. Indeed Allah does not waste the reward of the virtuous.

And neither do they incur any expense, big or small, nor do they cross any valley, but it is written to their account, so that Allah may reward them by the best of what they used to do.

Yet it is not for the faithful to go forth en masse. But why should not there a group from each of their sections go forth to become learned in religion, and to warn their people when they return to them, so that they may beware?

O you who have faith! Fight the faithless who are in your vicinity, and let them find severity in you, and know that Allah is with the Godwary.

Whenever a surah is sent down, there are some of them who say, ‘Which of you did it increase in faith?’ As for those who have faith, it increases them in faith, and they rejoice.

But as for those in whose heart is a sickness, it only adds defilement to their defilement, and they die while they are faithless.

Do they not see that they are tried once or twice every year? Yet they neither repent, nor do they take admonition.

Whenever a surah is sent down they look at one another: ‘Is anybody observing you?’ Then they slip away. Allah has turned aside their hearts, for they are a people who do not understand.

There has certainly come to you an apostle from among yourselves. Grievous to him is your distress; he has deep concern for you, and is most kind and merciful to the faithful.

But if they turn their backs [on you], say, ‘Allah is sufficient for me. There is no god except Him. In Him I have put my trust and He is the Lord of the Great Throne.’

Alif, Lam, Ra. These are the signs of the Wise Book.

Does it seem odd to these people that We have revealed to a man from among themselves, [declaring], ‘Warn mankind, and give good news to the faithful that they are in good standing with their Lord’? The faithless say, ‘This is indeed a plain magician.’

Indeed your Lord is Allah, who created the heavens and the earth in six days, and then settled on the Throne, directing the command. There is no intercessor, except by His leave. That is Allah, your Lord! So worship Him. Will you not then take admonition?

To Him will be the return of you all; [that is] Allah’s true promise. Indeed, He originates the creation, then He will bring it back that He may reward with justice those who have faith and do righteous deeds. As for the faithless, they shall have boiling water for drink, and a painful punishment because of what they used to defy.

It is He who made the sun a radiance and the moon a light, and ordained its phases that you might know the number of years and the calculation [of time]. Allah did not create all that except with justice. He elaborates the signs for a people who have knowledge.

Indeed in the alternation of night and day, and whatever Allah has created in the heavens and the earth, there are surely signs for a people who are Godwary.

Indeed those who do not expect to encounter Us and who are pleased with the life of this world and satisfied with it, and those who are oblivious of Our signs

—it is they whose refuge shall be the Fire because of what they used to earn.

Indeed those who have faith and do righteous deeds, their Lord guides them by the means of their faith. Streams will run for them in gardens of bliss.

Their call therein will be, ‘O Allah! Immaculate are You!’ and their greeting therein will be, ‘Peace!’ and their concluding call, ‘All praise belongs to Allah, the Lord of all the worlds.’

Were Allah to hasten ill for mankind with their haste for good, their term would have been over. But We leave those who do not expect to encounter Us bewildered in their rebellion.

When distress befalls man, he supplicates Us, [lying] on his side, sitting, or standing; but when We remove his distress, he passes on as if he had never supplicated Us concerning the distress that had befallen him. What they have been doing is thus presented as decorous to the transgressors.

Certainly We destroyed generations before you when they perpetrated wrongs: their apostles brought them manifest proofs, but they would not have faith. Thus do We requite the guilty lot.

Then We made you successors on the earth after them that We may observe how you will act.

When Our manifest signs are recited to them, those who do not expect to encounter Us say, ‘Bring a Quran other than this, or alter it.’ Say, ‘I may not alter it of my own accord. I follow only what is revealed to me. Indeed should I disobey my Lord, I fear the punishment of a tremendous day.’

Say, ‘Had Allah [so] wished, I would not have recited it to you, nor would He have made it known to you, for I have dwelled among you for a lifetime before it. Do you not exercise your reason?’

So who is a greater wrongdoer than him who fabricates a lie against Allah, or denies His signs? Indeed the guilty will not be felicitous.

They worship besides Allah that which neither causes them any harm, nor brings them any benefit, and they say, ‘These are our intercessors with Allah.’ Say, ‘Will you inform Allah about something He does not know in the heavens or on the earth?’ Immaculate is He and exalted above [having] any partners that they ascribe [to Him]!

Mankind were but a single [religious] community; then they differed. And were it not for a prior decree of your Lord, decision would have been made between them concerning that about which they differ.

They say, ‘Why has not some sign been sent down to him from his Lord?’ Say, ‘[The knowledge of] the Unseen belongs only to Allah. So wait. I too am waiting along with you.’

When We let people taste [Our] mercy after a distress that has befallen them, behold, they scheme against Our signs! Say, ‘Allah is more swift at devising.’ Indeed Our messengers write down what you scheme.

It is He who carries you across land and sea. When you are in the ships, and they sail along with them with a favourable wind, exulting in it, there comes upon them a tempestuous wind and waves assail them from every side, and they think that they are besieged, they invoke Allah putting exclusive faith in Him, ‘If You deliver us from this, we will surely be among the grateful.’

But when He delivers them, behold, they commit violations on the earth unduly! O mankind! Your violations are only to your own detriment. [These are] the wares of the life of this world; then to Us will be your return, whereat We will inform you concerning what you used to do.

The parable of the life of this world is that of water which We send down from the sky. It mingles with the earth’s vegetation from which humans and cattle eat. When the earth puts on its luster and is adorned, and its inhabitants think they have power over it, Our edict comes to it, by night or day, whereat We turn it into a mown field, as if it did not flourish the day before. Thus do We elaborate the signs for a people who reflect.

Allah invites to the abode of peace, and He guides whomever He wishes to a straight path.