Hizb 44

Say, ‘Who provides for you from the heavens and the earth?’ Say, ‘Allah! Indeed either we or you are rightly guided or in manifest error.’

Say, ‘You will not be questioned about our guilt, nor shall we be questioned about what you do.’

Say, ‘Our Lord will bring us together, then He will judge between us with justice, and He is the All-knowing Judge.’

Say, ‘Show me those whom you associate with Him as partners.’ No! [They can never show any such partner]. Indeed, He is Allah, the All-mighty, the All-wise.

We did not send you except as a bearer of good news and warner to all mankind, but most people do not know.

They say, ‘When will this promise be fulfilled, if you are truthful?’

Say, ‘Your promised hour is a day that you shall neither defer nor advance by an hour.’

The faithless say, ‘We will never believe in this Quran, nor in what was [revealed] before it.’ But if you were to see when the wrongdoers will be made to stop before their Lord casting the blame on one another. Those who were abased will say to those who were arrogant, ‘Had it not been for you, we would surely have been faithful.’

Those who were arrogant will say to those who were abased, ‘Did we keep you from guidance after it had come to you? No, you were guilty [yourselves].’

Those who were abased will say to those who were arrogant, ‘No, [it was your] night and day plotting, when you prompted us to forswear Allah and to set up equals to Him.’ They will hide their remorse when they sight the punishment, and We will put iron collars around the necks of the faithless. Shall they not be requited for what they used to do?

We did not send a warner to any town without its affluent ones saying, ‘We indeed disbelieve in what you have been sent with.’

They say, ‘We have greater wealth and more children, and we will not be punished!’

Say, ‘Indeed my Lord expands the provision for whomever He wishes and He tightens it, but most people do not know.’

It is not your wealth, nor your children, that will bring you close to Us in nearness, excepting those who have faith and act righteously. It is they for whom there will be a twofold reward for what they did, and they will be secure in lofty abodes.

As for those who contend with Our signs seeking to frustrate [their purpose], they will be brought to the punishment.

Say, ‘Indeed my Lord expands the provision for whomever of His servants that He wishes and tightens it, and He will repay whatever you may spend, and He is the best of providers.’

On the day He will muster them all together, He will say to the angels, ‘Was it you that these used to worship?’

They will say, ‘Immaculate are You! You are our wali, not they! No, they used to worship the jinn; most of them had faith in them.’

‘Today you have no power to benefit or harm one another,’ and We shall say to those who did wrong, ‘Taste the punishment of the Fire which you used to deny.’

When Our manifest signs are recited to them, they say, ‘This is just a man who desires to keep you from what your fathers used to worship.’ And they say, ‘This is nothing but a fabricated lie.’ The faithless say of the truth when it comes to them: ‘This is nothing but plain magic,’

though We did not give them any scriptures that they might have studied, nor did We send them any warner before you.

Those who were before them had also denied—and these have not attained one-tenth of what We had given them—they impugned My apostles, so how was My rebuttal!

Say, ‘I give you just a single advice: that you rise up for Allah’s sake, in pairs or singly, and then reflect: there is no madness in your companion; he is just a warner to you before [the befalling of] a severe punishment.’

Say, ‘Whatever reward I may have asked you is for your own good. My [true] reward lies only with Allah, and He is witness to all things.’

Say, ‘Indeed my Lord hurls the truth. [He is] the knower of all that is Unseen.’

Say, ‘The truth has come, and falsehood neither originates nor restores [anything].’

Say, ‘If I go astray, my going astray is only to my own harm, and if I am rightly guided that is because of what my Lord has revealed to me. Indeed He is all-hearing and nearmost.’

Were you to see them when they will be stricken with terror, without any escape, and are seized from a close quarter.

They will say, ‘We believe in it [now]!’ But how can they attain it from a far-off place,

when they denied it in the past—shooting at something invisible from a far-off place—

and a barrier is set between them and what they desire, as was done aforetime with their likes, who had remained in grave doubt?

All praise belongs to Allah, originator of the heavens and the earth, maker of the angels [His] messengers, possessing wings, two, three or four [of them]. He adds to the creation whatever He wishes. Indeed Allah has power over all things.

Whatever mercy Allah unfolds for the people, no one can withhold it; and whatever He withholds no one can release it except Him, and He is the All-mighty, the All-wise.

O mankind! Remember Allah’s blessing upon you! Is there any creator other than Allah who provides for you from the sky and the earth? There is no god except Him. So where do you stray?

If they impugn you, certainly [other] apostles were impugned before you, and all matters are returned to Allah.

O mankind! Allah’s promise is indeed true. So do not let the life of the world deceive you, nor let the Deceiver deceive you concerning Allah.

Satan is indeed your enemy, so treat him as an enemy. He only invites his confederates so that they may be among the inmates of the Blaze.

There is a severe punishment for the faithless; but for those who have faith and do righteous deeds, there will be forgiveness and a great reward.

Is someone the evil of whose conduct is presented as decorous to him, so he regards it as good.... Indeed Allah leads astray whomever He wishes, and guides whomever He wishes. So do not fret yourself to death regretting for them. Indeed Allah knows best what they do.

It is Allah who sends the winds and they raise a cloud; then We drive it toward a dead land and with it revive the earth after its death. Likewise will be the resurrection [of the dead].

Whoever seeks honour [should know that] honour entirely belongs to Allah. To Him ascends the good word, and He elevates righteous conduct; as for those who devise evil schemes, there is a severe punishment for them, and their plotting shall come to naught.

Allah created you from dust, then from a drop of [seminal] fluid, then He made you mates. No female conceives or delivers except with His knowledge, and no elderly person advances in years, nor is anything diminished of his life, but it is [recorded] in a Book. That is indeed easy for Allah.

Not alike are the two seas: this one sweet and agreeable, pleasant to drink, and that one briny and bitter, and from each you eat fresh meat and obtain ornaments, which you wear. And you see the ships plowing through them, that you may seek of His bounty, and so that you may give thanks.

He makes the night pass into the day and makes the day pass into the night, and He has disposed the sun and the moon, each moving for a specified term. That is Allah, your Lord; to Him belongs all sovereignty. As for those whom you invoke besides Him, they do not control so much as the husk of a date stone.

If you invoke them they will not hear your invocation, and even if they heard they cannot respond to you, and on the Day of Resurrection they will forswear your polytheism, and none can inform you like the One who is all-aware.

O mankind! You are the ones who stand in need of Allah, and Allah—He is the All-sufficient, the All-laudable.

If He wishes, He will take you away, and bring about a new creation;

and that is not a hard thing for Allah.

No bearer shall bear another’s burden, and should someone heavily burdened call [another] to carry it, nothing of it will be carried [by anyone] even if he should be a near relative. You can only warn those who fear their Lord in secret and maintain the prayer. Whoever purifies himself, purifies only for his own sake, and to Allah is the return.

The blind one and the seer are not equal,

nor darkness and light;

nor shade and torrid heat;

nor are the living equal to the dead. Indeed Allah makes whomever He wishes to hear, and you cannot make those who are in the graves hear you.

You are but a warner.

Indeed We have sent you with the truth as a bearer of good news and as a warner; and there is not a nation but a warner has passed in it.

If they impugn you, those before them have impugned [likewise]: their apostles brought them manifest proofs, [holy] writs, and illuminating scriptures.

Then I seized the faithless. So how was My rebuttal!

Have you not regarded that Allah sends down water from the sky, with which We produce fruits of diverse hues. And in the mountains are stripes, white and red, of diverse hues, and [others] pitch black?

And of humans and beasts and cattle there are likewise diverse hues. Only those of Allah’s servants having knowledge fear Him. Indeed Allah is all-mighty, all-forgiving.

Indeed those who recite the Book of Allah and maintain the prayer, and spend secretly and openly out of what We have provided them, expect a commerce that will never go bankrupt,

so that He may pay them their full reward and enhance them out of His bounty. Indeed He is all-forgiving, all-appreciative.

That which We have revealed to you of the Book is the truth, confirming what was [revealed] before it. Indeed Allah is all-aware, all-seeing about His servants.

Then We made those whom We chose from Our servants heirs to the Book. Yet some of them are those who wrong themselves, and some of them are average, and some of them are those who take the lead in all the good works by Allah’s will. That is the greatest grace [of Allah]!

Gardens of Eden, which they will enter, adorned therein with bracelets of gold and pearl, and their garments therein will be of silk.

They will say, ‘All praise belongs to Allah, who has removed all grief from us. Indeed Our Lord is all-forgiving, all-appreciative,

who has settled us in the everlasting abode by His grace. In it we are untouched by toil, and untouched by fatigue.’

As for the faithless, there is for them the fire of hell: they will neither be done away with so that they may die, nor shall its punishment be lightened for them. Thus do We requite every ingrate.

They shall cry therein for help: ‘Our Lord! Bring us out, so that we may act righteously—differently from what we used to do!’ ‘Did We not give you a lifelong enough that one who is heedful might take admonition? And [moreover] the warner had [also] come to you. Now taste [the consequence of your deeds], for the wrongdoers have no helper.’

Indeed Allah is the knower of the Unseen of the heavens and the earth. Indeed, He knows well what is in the breasts.

It is He who made you successors on the earth. So whoever is faithless, his unfaith is to his own detriment. The unfaith of the faithless does not increase them with their Lord [in anything] except disfavour, and their unfaith increases the faithless in nothing except loss.

Say, ‘Tell me about your ‘partners’ whom you invoke besides Allah? Show me what [part] of the earth have they created. Have they any share in the heavens?’ Have We given them a scripture so that they stand on a manifest proof from it? No, the wrongdoers do not promise one another [anything] except delusion.

Indeed Allah sustains the heavens and the earth lest they should fall apart, and if they were to fall apart, there is none who can sustain them except Him. Indeed He is all-forbearing, all-forgiving.

They had sworn by Allah with solemn oaths that if a warner were to come to them, they would be better guided than any of the nations. But when a warner came to them, it only increased their distance [from the truth],

due to their domineering [conduct] in the land and their devising of evil schemes; and evil schemes beset only their authors. So do they await anything except the precedent of the ancients? Yet you will never find any change in Allah’s precedent, and you will never find any revision in Allah’s precedent.

Have they not travelled over the land so that they may observe how was the fate of those who were before them? They were more powerful than them, and Allah is not to be frustrated by anything in the heavens or on the earth. Indeed, He is all-knowing, all-powerful.

Were Allah to take humans to task because of what they have earned, He would not leave any living being on its back. But He respites them until a specified time, and when their time comes, [He retributes them in accordance with their works], for Allah has been watching His servants.

Ya Seen!

By the Wise Quran,

you are indeed one of the apostles,

on a straight path.

[It is a scripture] sent down gradually from the All-mighty, the All-merciful

that you may warn a people whose fathers were not warned, so they are oblivious.

The word has certainly become due against most of them, so they will not have faith.

Indeed We have put iron collars around their necks, which are up to the chins, so their heads are upturned.

And We have put a barrier before them and a barrier behind them, then We have blind-folded them, so they do not see.

It is the same to them whether you warn them or do not warn them, they will not have faith.

You can only warn someone who follows the Reminder and fears the All-beneficent in secret; so give him the good news of forgiveness and a noble reward.

Indeed it is We who revive the dead and write what they have sent ahead and their effects [which they left behind], and We have figured everything in a manifest Imam.

Cite for them the example of the inhabitants of the town when the apostles came to it.

When We sent to them two [apostles], they impugned both of them. Then We reinforced them with a third, and they said, ‘We have indeed been sent to you.’

They said, ‘You are no other than human beings like us, and the All-beneficent has not sent down anything, and you are only lying.’

They said, ‘Our Lord knows that we have indeed been sent to you,

and our duty is only to communicate in clear terms.’

They said, ‘Indeed we take you for a bad omen. If you do not desist we will stone you, and surely a painful punishment will visit you from us.’

They said, ‘Your bad omens attend you. What! If you are admonished.... Indeed, you are an unrestrained lot.’

There came a man hurrying from the city outskirts. He said, ‘O my people! Follow the apostles!

Follow them who do not ask you any reward and they are rightly guided.

Why should I not worship Him who has originated me, and to whom you shall be brought back?

Shall I take gods besides Him? If the All-beneficent desired to cause me any distress, their intercession will not avail me in any way, nor will they rescue me.

Indeed, then I would be in manifest error.

Indeed I have faith in your Lord, so listen to me.’

He was told, ‘Enter paradise!’ He said, ‘Alas! Had my people only known

for what my Lord forgave me and made me one of the honoured ones!’