The like of the state of the people of Noah and Ad and Themoud,
And of those who came after them; yet God willeth not injustice to his
servants.
And, O my people! I indeed fear for you the day of mutual outcry-
The day when ye shall be turned back from the Judgment into hell. No
protector shall ye have then against God. And he whom God shall mislead no
guide shall there be for him.
Moreover, Joseph had come to you before with clear tokens, but ye ceased not
to doubt of the message with which he came to you, until when he died, ye
said, 'God will by no means raise up an apostle after him.' " Thus God
misleadeth him who is the transgressor, the doubter.
They who gainsay the signs of God without authority having come to them, are
greatly hated by God and by those who believe. Thus God sealeth up every
proud, contumacious heart.
And Pharaoh said, "O Haman,8 Build for me a tower that I may reach the
avenues,
The avenues of the heavens, and may mount to the God of Moses, for I verily
deem him a liar."
And thus the evil of his doings was made fair-seeming to Pharaoh, and he
turned away from the path of truth; but the artifice of Pharaoh ended only in
his ruin.
And he who believed said, "O my people! follow me: into the right way will I
guide you.
O my people! this present life is only a passing joy, but the life to come is
the mansion that abideth.
Whoso shall have wrought evil shall not be recompensed but with its like; but
whoso shall have done the things that are right, whether male or female, and
is a believer-these shall enter paradise: good things unreckoned shall they
enjoy therein.
And, O my people! how is it that I bid you to salvation, but that ye bid me
to the fire?
Ye invite me to deny God, and to join with him gods of whom I know nothing;
but I invite you to the Mighty, the Forgiving.
No doubt is there that they to whom ye invite me are not to be invoked either
in this world or in the world to come: and that unto God is our return, and
that the transgressors shall be the inmates of the fire.
Then shall ye remember what I am saying unto you: and to God commit I my
case: Verily, God beholdeth his servants."
So God preserved him from the evils which they had planned, and the woe of
the punishment encompassed the people of Pharaoh.
It is the fire to which they shall be exposed morning and evening, and on the
day when "the Hour" shall arrive-"Bring in the people of Pharaoh into the
severest punishment."
And when they shall wrangle together in the fire, the weak shall say to those
who had borne themselves so proudly, "It is you we followed: will ye
therefore relieve us from aught of the fire?"
And those proud ones shall say, "Verily we are all in it; for now hath God
judged between his servants."
And they who are in the fire shall say to the keepers of Hell, "Implore your
Lord that he would give us ease but for one day from this torment."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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