6. Al-An'aam

That, namely, the prohibiting to them of wholesome things is a requital with which, We requited them, for their insolence; verily We are truthful, in promising them requital for insolence.

So, if they deny you, [by saying] that God is the Lord of all-embracing mercy and will not chastise us for our insolence, then say: 'Yea! Your Lord is the Lord of all-embracing mercy, but He is also the Lord of severe vanquishing whose mercy will not repel His might, from the sinning folk'. Rather, it may be that He has deposited His vanquishing in the form of His graciousness and His graciousness in the form of His vanquishing.

So, those who were before them gave the lie, that is, [so] the deniers gave the lie to messengers before them by making their disbelief [as something] dependent on the will of God, out of obduracy and recalcitrance, and they were [indeed] chastised for their disbelief. Say: 'Have you any knowledge, such that you can adduce for usḍ, that is to say, if you were to have any knowledge or proof of that, then illustrate [it]. He says this by way of allusion to their statement 'Had God willed, we would not have been idolaters [Q. 6:148], for had they said that on the basis of some [factual] knowledge, they would have known that the faith of those who believe in the Oneness [of God] and everything else only comes to be through the will of God. So on the basis of what are they [the deniers] hostile to them when they [the believers] have not rejected them, but even associated with them until there remained no disagreement between them and the believers. By God, had they said that out of knowledge, they would not have actually been idolaters, nay, rather affirmers of Oneness. But they followed supposition regarding that and based themselves on estimation (taqdīr) and conjecture, their purpose being denial and recalcitrance; and what they have heard from the messengers constitutes an indictment of them and proof that they are not prevented from [the call of] the messengers. [All of that is] because they are veiled at the station of the soul: whence certainty for them then and how could they know what God's will might beḍ

Say: 'To God belongs the conclusive argument: in other words, if your supposition were sincere, in terms of making your idolatry contingent upon the will of God, then you have no argument against the believers or other religious folk, since every religion would then be the result of God's will, in which case you ought to be in agreement with them and to believe them. Nay, God has the conclusive argument against you in that there is an obligation upon you to believe them [the messengers] and to affirm that you have ascribed to the One without whose will nothing takes place partners whose will there is no trace of outright. Hence you are pre-eternally wretched, deserving of banishment and punishment; for had He willed, He could have guided all of you', in other words, yes you are correct [in one sense], but just as He willed that you be unbelievers, had He willed He could have guided you all. On the basis of what, however, do you [think that you] know that He willed not that you be guided for you to then insist [on your idolatry]. This [statement] is meant to incite those among them who may have the preparedness to curb [the inclination to unbelief] and be guided and thus revert from idolatry and become a believer.