¹⁰⁰ Say thou: “Not the same are the bad and the good, although there impress thee the abundance of the bad.” So be in prudent fear¹ of God, O you men of understanding, that you might be successful.

¹⁰¹ O you who heed warning:¹ ask not about things which, if made clear to you, would distress you; but if you ask about them while the Qur’an² is being sent down, they will be made clear to you. God has pardoned that;³ and God is forgiving and clement.

¹⁰² There did ask a people before you, then became deniers thereof.

¹⁰³ God appointed not any baḥīrah¹ or sā’ibah² or waṣīlah³ or ḥām⁴ — but those who ignore warning⁵ invent lies⁶ about God; and most of them do not reason.

¹⁰⁴ And when it is said to them: “Come to what God has sent down, and to the Messenger,” they say: “Sufficient for us is that upon which we found our fathers.”¹ Even though their fathers knew not anything and were not guided?

¹⁰⁵ O you who heed warning:¹ upon you are your souls;² whoso has gone astray cannot harm you when you are guided. To God is your return all together; then He will inform you of what you did.

¹⁰⁶ O you who heed warning:¹ a witness between you when death approaches one of you at the time of bequest is two just men among you; or two others from other than yourselves if you are travelling in the earth when the calamity of death befalls you. Detain them² after the duty,³ and they⁴ shall swear by God, if you doubt:⁵ “We would not sell it for a price,⁶ though he were a relative,⁷ nor will we conceal the witness of God; then would we be among the sinners.”

¹⁰⁷ But if it be found that they¹ have laid claim in sin,² then two others shall stand in their place³ — the two foremost from those that lay claim — and let them⁴ swear by God: “Our witness is worthier⁵ than their⁶ witness; and we have not transgressed: then would we be among the wrongdoers.”⁷

¹⁰⁸ That will tend to them bearing witness properly,¹ or fearing² that oaths will be taken after their oaths. And be in prudent fear³ of God, and listen; and God guides not the perfidious⁴ people.

¹⁰⁹ The day God gathers the messengers, He will say: “What was the response to you?” They will say: “We have no knowledge; Thou art the Knower of the Unseen Realms.”

¹¹⁰ (When¹ God will say: “O Jesus,² son of Mary:³ remember thou My favour to thee and to thy mother: when I strengthened thee with the Spirit of Holiness, thou speaking to men in the cradle and in maturity; and when I taught thee the Writ⁴ and wisdom,⁵ and the Torah and the Gospel;⁶ and when thou didst create of clay the likeness of a bird by My leave, and blewest into it and it became a bird by My leave, and thou didst heal the blind and the leper by My leave; and when thou broughtest forth the dead by My leave; and when I restrained the children of Israel from thee when thou camest to them with clear signs”; then those who ignored warning⁷ among them said: “This is only obvious sorcery”;⁸

¹¹¹ And when I revealed¹ to the disciples:² “Believe in³ Me and My messenger”; they said: “We believe; and bear thou witness that we are submitting”;⁴

¹¹² When the disciples¹ said: “O Jesus,² son of Mary:³ is thy Lord able to send down upon us a table spread⁴ from the sky?” he said: “Be in prudent fear⁵ of God, if you be believers.”⁶

¹¹³ They said: “We wish to eat thereof and our hearts to be at rest, and to know that thou hast spoken truth to us, and to be among the witnesses thereto.”

¹¹⁴ Jesus,¹ son of Mary said:² “O God, our Lord: send Thou down upon us a table spread³ from the sky to be a feast for us — for the first of us and the last of us — and a proof⁴ from Thee; and give Thou us provision; and Thou art the best of providers.”

¹¹⁵ God said: “I will send it down upon you; then whoso denies thereafter among you: him will I punish with a punishment wherewith I will not punish any among all mankind.”

¹¹⁶ And when God will¹ say: “O Jesus,² son of Mary:³ didst thou say to men: ‘Take me and my mother as two gods besides⁴ God?’” he will say: “Glory⁵ be to Thee! It was not for me to say that to which I had no right!⁶ If I had said it, then Thou wouldst have known it. Thou knowest what is in my soul, and I know not what is in Thy soul; Thou art the Knower of the Unseen Realms.

¹¹⁷ “I said not to them but what Thou commandedst me: ‘Serve God, my Lord and your Lord.’ And I was a witness to them while I was among them; but when Thou tookest¹ me, Thou wast the watcher over them; and Thou art witness to all things.

¹¹⁸ “If Thou punish them, they are Thy servants; and if Thou forgive them, Thou art the Exalted in Might, the Wise.”¹)

¹¹⁹ God will say:¹ “This is the day in which their truthfulness benefits the truthful.” They have gardens beneath which rivers flow, they abiding eternally therein forever; God is pleased with them, and they pleased with Him; that is the Great Achievement.

¹²⁰ To God belongs the dominion of the heavens and the earth and what is in them; and He is over all things powerful.