Allah knows what every female bears, and by how much the wombs fall short (of their time or number) or exceed. Everything with Him is in (due) proportion. 8 the Knower of the unseen and the visible, the All-great, the All-exalted: 9 It is all the same to Him whether you speak in secret or out loud, try to hide in the darkness of night or walk in the brightness of day. 10 For him are angels in succession, before him and behind him; they guard him with Allah's command. Verily Allah altereth not that which is with a people until they alter that which is with themselves. And when Allah intendeth evil unto a people there is no turning it back; nor is for them, beside Him, any patron. 11 It is He who shows you the lightning, for fear and hope, and produces the heavy clouds; 12 The thunder exalts His praise, and so are the angels are in awe of Him. He looses the thunderbolts and smites whosoever He will. Yet they dispute about Allah who is Mighty in power. 13 Only the prayer to Him is truthful; and whomever they pray to besides Him, do not hear them at all, but like one who has his hands outstretched towards water that it may come into his mouth, and it will never come; and every prayer of the disbelievers remains wandering. 14 And unto Allah falleth prostrate whosoever is in the heavens and the earth, willingly or unwillingly, as do their shadows in the morning and the evening hours. ۩ 15 Say: 'Who is the Lord of the heavens and of the earth?' Say: 'God.' Say: 'Then have you taken unto you others beside Him to be your protectors, even such as have no power to profit or hurt themselves?' Say: 'Are the blind and the seeing man equal, or are the shadows and the light equal? Or have they ascribed to God associates who created as He created, so that creation is all alike to them?' Say: 'God is the Creator of everything, and He is the One, the Omnipotent.' 16 He sendeth down water from the sky, so that valleys flow according to their measure, and the flood beareth (on its surface) swelling foam - from that which they smelt in the fire in order to make ornaments and tools riseth a foam like unto it - thus Allah coineth (the similitude of) the true and the false. Then, as for the foam, it passeth away as scum upon the banks, while, as for that which is of use to mankind, it remaineth in the earth. Thus Allah coineth the similitudes. 17 For those who obey their Lord is excellence. For those who fail to obey, the reckoning will be hard, even if they possess and give as ransom all that there is on the earth, and as much more; and Hell will be their abode: How wretched is its wide expanse! 18