ABOUT WHAT do they [most often] ask one another?

About the awesome tiding [of resurrection],

on which they [so utterly] disagree.

Nay, but in time they will come to understand [it]!

And once again: Nay, but in time they will come to understand!

HAVE WE NOT made the earth a resting-place [for you],

and the mountains [its] pegs?

And We have created you in pairs;

and We have made your sleep [a symbol of] death

and made the night [its] cloak

and made the day [a symbol of] life.

And We have built above you seven firmaments,

and have placed [therein the sun,] a lamp full of blazing splendour.

And from the wind-driven clouds We send down waters pouring in abundance,

so that We might bring forth thereby grain, and herbs,

and gardens dense with follage.

VERILY, the Day of Distinction [between the true and the false] has indeed its appointed time:

the Day when the trumpet [of resurrection] is sounded and you all come forward in multitudes;

and when the skies are opened and become [as wide-flung] gates;

and when the mountains are made to vanish as if they had been a mirage.

[On that Day,] verily, hell will lie in wait [for those who deny the truth] –

a goal for all who are wont to transgress the bounds of what is right!

In it shall they remain for a long time.

Neither coolness shall they taste therein nor any [thirst-quenching] drink –

only burning despair and ice-cold darkness:

a meet requital [for their sins]!

Behold, they were not expecting to be called to account,

having given the lie to Our messages one and all:

but We have placed on record every single thing [of what they did].

[And so We shall say:] "Taste, then, [the fruit of your evil doings,] for now We shall bestow on you nothing but more and more suffering!"

[But,] verily for the God-conscious there is supreme fulfilment in store:

luxuriant gardens and vinyards,

and splendid companions well matched,

and a cup [of happiness] overflowing.

No empty talk will they hear in that [paradise], nor any lie.

[All this will be] a reward from thy Sustainer, a gift in accordance with [His Own] reckoning –

[a reward from] the Sustainer of the heavens and the earth and all that is between them, the Most Gracious! [And] none shall have it in their power to raise their voices unto Him

on the Day when all [human] souls and all the angels will stand up in ranks: none will speak but he to whom the Most Gracious will have given leave; and [everyone] will say [only] what is right.

That will be the Day of Ultimate Truth: whoever wills, then, let him take the path that leads towards his Sustainer!

Verily, We have warned you of suffering near at hand - [suffering] on the Day when man shall [clearly] see what his hands have sent ahead, and when he who has denied the truth shall say, "Oh, would that I were mere dust...!"