7. Al-A'raaf

those who took their religion for a diversion and a game, and whom the life of this world has deluded.’ Therefore today We have forgotten them, We have left them in the Fire, just as they forgot the encounter of this day of theirs, when they neglected to perform [good] deeds for it, and because they used to deny Our signs.

And indeed We have brought them, that is, the people of Mecca, a Book, the Qur’ān, which We have detailed, [which] We have made clear through tidings and the Promise [of reward] and the Threat [of punishment], with knowledge (‘alā ‘ilmin is a circumstantial qualifier, in other words, ‘knowing what has been detailed in it’), a guidance (hudan is [also] a circumstantial qualifier referring to the hā’ [the suffixed pronoun of fassālnā-hu, ‘which We have detailed’]) and a mercy for a people who believe, in it.

Surely your Lord is God, Who created the heavens and the earth in six days, of the days of this world, that is to say, in the equivalent thereof, since there was no sun then. Had He willed He could have created them in an instant; but the reason for His not having done so is that He wanted to teach His creatures to be circumspect; then presided upon the Throne, a presiding befitting of Him (al-‘arsh, ‘throne’, in the [classical] language is the elevated seat on which a king sits). He cloaks (read yughshī or yughashshī) the night with the day, that is, He covers each one with the other: each following the other in swift pursuit — and the sun and the moon and the stars (if all of these are read in the accusative, then they constitute a supplement to al-samāwāt, ‘the heavens’, and if in the nominative, then they constitute the subject of the sentence, the predicate of which follows) have been made subservient, [have been] subdued, by His command, by His power. Verily, His is, all, creation and the command, in its entirety. Blessed, Magnified, be God, the Lord, the Master, of the Worlds!

Call upon your Lord humbly (tadarru‘an is a circumstantial qualifier), in subservience, and quietly, in secret. Truly, He loves not the aggressors, who are braggarts and loud-mouthed in [their] supplications.

And work not corruption in the land, through idolatry and acts of disobedience, after it has been set right, as a result of the sending forth of messengers [to it], and call upon Him in fear, of His punishment, and in hope, of His mercy — surely the mercy of God is near to the virtuous, the obedient (qarīb, ‘near’, as the predicate of [the feminine noun] rahma, ‘mercy’, is in the masculine because it [rahma] is annexed to Allāh, ‘God’).

He it is Who sends the winds, unfolding with His mercy, that is, dispersing before the rains (a variant reading [for nushuran, ‘unfolding’] has nushran; another reading has nashran as the verbal noun; and a third variant has bushran, meaning mubashshiran, ‘[with which] He is bearing good tidings [of His mercy]’; the singular of the first reading is nashūr, similar [in pattern] to rasūl, ‘messenger’; the singular of the last is bashīr) until, when they, the winds, bear heavy clouds, [clouds heavy] with rain, We lead it, that is, [We lead] the clouds (herein is a shift from the third [to the first] person), to a dead land, one devoid of any vegetation, in other words, [We lead it there] in order to revive it, and then We send down thereon, on that land, and bring forth thereby, by this water, fruits of every kind. Like that, bringing forth, We shall bring forth the dead, from their graves, through revivification, so that you might remember, and believe.

As for the good land, the one of rich soil, its vegetation comes forth, wholesomely, by permission of its Lord — this is a similitude of the believer who, when he hears an admonition, he [heeds it and] benefits from it. While as for the, one whose soil is, bad — the vegetation in, it comes forth only miserably, laboriously and with difficulty — this is the similitude of the disbeliever. Even, as We have made clear what has been mentioned, so We dispense, We make clear, the signs for a people who are thankful, to God and so believe.

Verily (laqad is the response to an oath that has been omitted) We sent Noah to his people, and he said, ‘O my people, worship God! You have no god other than Him (read ghayrihi as an adjective of ilāh, ‘god’, or ghayruhu as a substitution in its place [sc. instead of min ilāhin, ‘any god’). Truly, I fear for you, if you worship other than Him, the chastisement of an Awful Day’, that is, the Day of Resurrection.

The council, of the respected elders, of his people, said: ‘Truly We see you in manifest error’.