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Sale, 1734

CHAP. XXXII.

Intitled, Adoration [a] ; revealed at Mecca.


In the name of the most merciful God.
A. L. M [b] . The revelation of this book, there is no doubt thereof, is from the Lord of all creatures. Will they say, Mohammed hath forged it? Nay it is the truth from thy Lord, that thou mayest preach to a people, unto whom no preacher hath come before thee [c] ; peradventure they will be directed. It is God who hath created the heavens and the earth, and whatever is between them, in six days; and then ascended his throne. Ye have no patron or intercessor besides him. Will ye not therefore consider? He governeth all things from heaven even to the earth: hereafter shall they return unto him, on the day whose length shall be a thousand years [d] , of [339] those which ye compute. This is he who knoweth the future, and the present; the mighty, the merciful. It is he who hath made everything which he hath created exceeding good; and first created man of clay, and afterwards made his posterity of an extract of despicable water [a] ; and then formed him into proper shape, and breathed of his spirit into him; and hath given you the senses of hearing and seeing, and hearts to understand. How small thanks do ye return! And they say, When we shall lye hidden in the earth, shall we be raised thence a new creature? Yea, they deny the meeting of their Lord at the resurrection. Say, The angel of death [b] , who is set over you, shall cause you to die: then shall ye be brought back unto your Lord. If thou couldest see, when the wicked shall bow down their heads before their Lord, saying, O Lord, we have seen, and have heard: suffer us therefore to return into the world, and we will work that which is right; since we are now certain of the truth of what hath been preached to us: thou wouldest see an amazing sight. If we had pleased we had certainly given unto every soul its direction: but the word which hath proceeded from me must necessarily be fulfilled, when I said, Verily I will fill hell with genii and men, altogether [c] . Taste therefore the torment prepared for you, because ye have forgotten the coming of this your day: we also have forgotten you; taste therefore the punishment of eternal duration, for that which ye have wrought. Verily they only believe in our signs, who, when they are warned thereby, fall down adoring, and celebrate the praise of their Lord, and are not elated with pride; their sides are raised from their beds, calling on their Lord with fear and with hope; and they distribute alms out of what we have bestowed on them. No soul [d] knoweth the complete satisfaction [e] which is secretly prepared for them, as a reward for that which they have wrought. Shall he, therefore, who is a true believer, be as he who is an impious transgressor? They shall not be held equal. As to those who believe and do that which is right, they shall have gardens of perpetual abode, an ample recompense for that which they shall have wrought: but as for those who [340] impiously transgress, their abode shall be hell fire; so often as they shall endeavor to get thereout, they shall be dragged back into the same, and it shall be said unto them, Taste ye the torment of hell fire, which ye rejected as a falsehood. And we will cause them to taste the nearer punishment of this world, besides the more grievous punishment of the next; peradventure they will repent. Who is more unjust than he who is warned by the signs of his Lord, and then turneth aside from the same? We will surely take vengeance on the wicked. We heretofore delivered the book of the law unto Moses; wherefore be not thou in doubt as to the revelation thereof [a] : and we ordained the same to be a direction unto the children of Israel; and we appointed teachers from among them, who should direct the people at our command, when they had persevered with patience, and had firmly believed in our signs. Verily thy Lord will judge between them, on the day of resurrection, concerning that wherein they have disagreed. Is it not known unto them how many generations we have destroyed before them, through whose dwellings they walk [b] ? Verily herein are signs: will they not therefore hearken? Do they not see that we drive rain unto a land bare of grass and parched up, and thereby produce corn, of which their cattle eat, and themselves also? Will they not therefore regard? The infidels say to the true believers, When will this decision be made between us, if ye speak truth? Answer, On the day of that decision [c] , the faith of those who shall have disbelieved shall not avail them; neither shall they be respited any longer. Wherefore avoid them, and expect the issue: verily they expect to obtain some advantage over thee.

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[a] The title is taken from the middle of the chapter, where the believers are said to fall down adoring

[b] See the Prelim. Disc. §. III p. 59, &c.

[c] See chap. 28. p. 321.

[d] A thousand years;] As to the reconciliation of this passage with another [1] , which seems contradictory, see the Prelim. Disc. §. IV. p. 84.
Some, however, do not interpret the passage before us of the resurrection, but suppose that the words here describe the making and executing of the decrees of God, which are sent down from heaven to earth, and are returned (or ascend, as the verb properly signifies) back to him, after they have been put in execution; and present themselves, as it were, so executed, to his knowledge, in the space of a day with God, but with man, of a thousand years. Others imagine this space to be the time which the angels, who carry the divine decrees, and bring them back executed, take in descending and reascending, because the distance from heaven to earth is a journey of five hundred years: and others fancy that the angels bring down at once decrees for a thousand years to come, which being expired, they return back for fresh orders, &c [1] .

[1] Chap. 70.

[1] Al Beidawi.

[a] An extract of despicable water;] i.e. Seed.

[b] See the Prelim. Disc. §. IV. p. 72.

[c] See chap. 7. p. 118, and chap. 11. p. 187.

[d] No soul;] Not even an angel of those who approach nearest God’s throne, nor any prophet who hath been sent by him [2] .

[2] Idem.

[e] The complete satisfaction;] Literally, The joy of the eyes. The commentators fail not, on occasion of this passage, to produce that saying of their prophet, which was originally none of his own; God saith, I have prepared for my righteous servants, what eye hath not seen, nor hath ear heard, nor hath entered into the heart of man to conceive.

[a] Be not thou in doubt as to the revelation thereof;] Or, as some interpret it, of the revelation of the Korân to thyself; since the delivery of the law to Moses proves that the revelation of the Korân to thee is not the first instance of the kind. Others think the words should be translated thus: Be thou not in doubt as to thy meeting of that prophet; supposing that the interview between Moses and Mohammed in the sixth heaven, when the latter took his night journey thither, is here intended [1] .

[1] Idem.

[b] Through whose dwellings they walk;] The Meccans frequently passing by the places where the Adites, Thamudites, Midianites, Sodomites, &c., once dwelt.

[c] On the day of that decision;] That is, on the day of judgment; tho’ some suppose the day here intended to be that of the victory at Bedr, or else that of the taking of Mecca, when several of those who had been proscribed were put to death without remission [2] .

[2] See the Prelim. Disc. §. p. 55.