10. Yunus

That, Doer of all these things, then is God, your true, established, Lord: so what is there, after truth, except error? (the interrogative is meant as an affirmative, in other words, there is nothing after it [truth] other than that [error]; thus he who mistakes the truth, which is the worship of God, has fallen into error). How then are you turned away, from faith, despite the proofs having been established?

Thus, just as those are turned away from faith so, the Word of your Lord is justified concerning those who are wicked, [those who] disbelieve, and this [Word] is [either] the verse, [Q. 32:13]‘Verily I shall fill Hell [with jinn and mankind, together]’, or it is [the following:] that they do not believe.

Say: ‘Is there of those whom you associate [with God] one that originates creation, then recreated it?’ Say: ‘God originates creation, then recreates it. How then are you deviated?’, turned away from worshipping Him, despite proof having been established.

Say: ‘Is there of those whom you associate [with God] one that guides to the truth?’, by [means of] setting up [definitive] arguments and creating guidance. Say: ‘God guides to the truth; is One Who guides to the truth — and this is God — more deserving of being followed, or one who does not guide, [one who] is not [himself] guided, unless he is guided?, more deserving of being followed? (the interrogative is meant as an affirmation and a rebuke, in other words, the former is more deserving). So what is wrong with you, how do you judge?’, [how do you make] this corrupt judgement, one where what does not deserve to be followed is followed?

And most of them, in worshipping idols, follow nothing but conjecture, since they imitate their fathers therein; truly conjecture avails nothing against truth, when what is sought is knowledge. Surely God is Knower of what they do, and will requite them for it.

And this Qur’ān is not such as could ever be produced, that is, [it could not be] a fabrication, [by anyone] besides God; but it is, revealed [as], a confirmation of what is before it, of Scriptures, and a detailing of the Book, a exposition of the rulings and other matters which God has prescribed — wherein is no doubt, no uncertainty — from the Lord of the Worlds (min rabbi’l-‘ālamīn is semantically connected to tasdīqa, ‘a confirmation’, or to an omitted unzila, ‘revealed’; a variant reading [for accusative tasdīqa] has the nominative tasdīqu and nominative tafsīlu, ‘a detailing’, [for the accusative tafsīla] by [reading] an implied huwa, ‘it is’).

Or do they say, ‘He has invented it’?, Muhammad (s) has invented it. Say: ‘Then bring a sūra like it, in terms of the clarity and the rhetorical excellence of its language, by way of invention, for you are eloquent speakers of Arabic like me; and call upon whom you can, for help in this [matter], besides God, that is, other than Him, if you are truthful’, in [saying] that this is an invention. But they were not able to do this.

God, exalted be He, says: Nay, but they denied that, the knowledge whereof they did not comprehend, that is, [they denied] the Qur’ān and did not reflected upon it; and whereof the interpretation, the consequence of the threats [made] therein, has not yet come to them. So, in the same [manner of] denial, those who were before them denied, their messengers. Behold then what was the consequence for the evildoers!, for denying the messengers, in other words, [behold] how their affair was concluded, by their being destroyed. In a similar manner, We shall destroy these [people].

And of them, that is, [of] the people of Mecca, are some who believe in it, God being aware of this in their case, and some who would never believe therein. And your Lord knows very well the corrupters: this is a threat for them.