The Koran Part 23

1 Sidjin is a prison in h.e.l.l which gives its name to the register of actions there kept, as Illiyoun, a name of the lofty apartments of Paradise, is transferred to the register of the righteous.

2 Derived from the root sanima, to be high: this water being conveyed to the highest apartments in the Pavilions of Paradise.

SURA LXIX.-THE INEVITABLE [XLII.]

MECCA.-52 Verses

In the Name of G.o.d, the Compa.s.sionate, the Merciful

The INEVITABLE!

And who shall make thee comprehend what the Inevitable is?

Themoud and Ad treated the day of Terrors1 as a lie.

So as to Themoud,2 they were destroyed by cras.h.i.+ng thunder bolts;

And as to Ad, they were destroyed by a roaring and furious blast.

It did the bidding of G.o.d3 against them seven nights and eight days together, during which thou mightest have seen the people laid low, as though they had been the trunks of hollow palms;

And couldst thou have seen one of them surviving?

Pharaoh also, and those who flourished before him, and the overthrown cities, committed sin,-

And disobeyed the Sent one of their Lord; therefore did he chastise them with an acc.u.mulated chastis.e.m.e.nt.

When the Flood rose high, we bare you in the Ark,

That we might make that event a warning to you, and that the retaining ear might retain it.

But when one blast shall be blown on the trumpet,

And the earth and the mountains shall be upheaved, and shall both be crushed into dust at a single crus.h.i.+ng,

On that day the woe that must come suddenly shall suddenly come,4

And the heaven shall cleave asunder, for on that day it shall be fragile;

And the angels shall be on its sides, and over them on that day eight shall bear up the throne of thy Lord.

On that day ye shall be brought before Him: none of your hidden deeds shall remain hidden:

And he who shall have his book given to him in his right hand, will say to his friends, "Take ye it; read ye my book;

I ever thought that to this my reckoning I should come."

And his shall be a life that shall please him well,

In a lofty garden,

Whose cl.u.s.ters shall be near at hand:

"Eat ye and drink with healthy relish, as the meed of what ye sent on beforehand in the days which are past."

But he who shall have his book given into his left hand, will say, "O that my book had never been given me!

And that I had never known my reckoning!

O that death had made an end of me!

My wealth hath not profited me!

My power hath perished from me!"

"Lay ye hold on him and chain him,

Then at the h.e.l.l-fire burn him,

Then into a chain whose length is seventy cubits thrust him;

For he believed not in G.o.d, the Great,

And was not careful to feed the poor;

No friend therefore shall he have here this day,

Nor food, but corrupt sores,

Which none shall eat but the sinners."

It needs not that I swear by what ye see,

And by that which ye see not,

That this verily is the word of an apostle worthy of all honour!

And that it is not the word of a poet-how little do ye believe!

Neither is it the word of a soothsayer (Kahin)-how little do ye receive warning!

It is a missive from the Lord of the worlds.

But if Muhammad had fabricated concerning us any sayings,

We had surely seized him by the right hand,

And had cut through the vein of his neck.5