5. Al-Maaida

And they thought, they presumed that, there would be no (read as an lā takūnu, where an has been softened; or read an lā takūna, where it [an] requires a [following] subjunctive, that is to say, ‘that there would [not] befall [them]’) trial, a punishment against them, for their denial of the messengers and their slaying of them; and so they were wilfully blind, to the truth and could not see it, and deaf, [unable] to hear it. Then God relented to them, when they repented, then they were wilfully blind and deaf, a second time, many of them (kathīrun minhum substitutes for the [third] person [‘they’]); and God sees what they do, and will requite them for it.

They indeed are disbelievers those who say, ‘Indeed God is the Messiah, son of Mary’ (a similar verse has preceded [Q. 5:17]). For the Messiah said, to them, ‘O Children of Israel, worship God, my Lord and your Lord, for, I am a servant and not a god. Verily he who associates anything with God, in worship, for him God has made Paradise forbidden, He has forbidden him admittance to it, and his abode shall be the Fire; and for wrongdoers (wa-mā li’l-zālimīna min, the min is extra) there shall be no helpers’, to guard them against the chastisement of God.

They are indeed disbelievers those who say, ‘God is the third of three’, gods, that is, He is one of them, the other two being Jesus and his mother, and they [who claim this] are a Christian sect; when there is no god but the One God. If they do not desist from what they say, when they declare a trinity, and profess His Oneness, those of them who disbelieve, that is, [those] who are fixed upon unbelief, shall suffer a painful chastisement, namely, the Fire.

Will they not turn in repentance to God and seek His forgiveness?, for what they say (the interrogative is intended as a rebuke); God is Forgiving, to the one who repents, Merciful, to him.

Say: ‘Do you worship besides God, that is, other than Him, what cannot hurt or profit you? God is the Hearer, of your sayings, the Knower’, of your circumstances (the interrogative is meant as a disavowal).

Say: ‘O People of the Scripture, Jews and Christians, do not go to extremes, do [not] overstep the bounds, in your religion, other than those, extremes, of truth, neither lowering nor elevating Jesus above his proper place, and do not follow the whims of a people who went astray formerly, on account of their extremism — these were their forefathers — and have led many, [other] people, astray, and strayed from the even way’, from the path of truth (al-sawā’ originally means ‘middle’).

Cursed were the disbelievers of the Children of Israel by the tongue of David, when he invoked God against them and they were transformed into apes — these were the people of Eilat — and by Jesus, son of Mary, when he invoked God against them and they were transformed into pigs — they were the ones [who ate] at the Table [cf. Q. 5:115, below] — that, cursing, was because of their disobedience and their transgression.

They did not prevent one another, that is, one would not forbid the other from committing again, any indecency that they committed; verily evil was what they used to do, [verily evil] was this deed of theirs.

You, O Muhammad (s), see many of them affiliating with those who disbelieve, from among the Meccans, out of spite for you. Evil is that, in the way of deeds, which their souls have offered on their behalf, for [the day of] their inevitable return, such that God is wroth with them and in the chastisement they shall abide.