The Pen (Al-Qalam)
In the Name of Allah, the Most Beneficent, the Most Merciful
۞ Nun. By the Pen, and what they inscribe, 1 By your Lord's Grace, you are not afflicted with madness, 2 And verily thine shall be a hire unending. 3 And lo! thou art of a tremendous nature. 4 So you shall see, and they (too) shall see, 5 which of you is afflicted with madness. 6 Surely your Lord knows well those who have strayed from His Way just as He knows well those who are on the Right Way. 7 Wherefore obey not thou the beliers. 8 Their desire is that thou shouldst be pliant: so would they be pliant. 9 And yield not to any mean swearer 10 the fault-finder who goes around slandering, 11 Who hinders men from (doing) good, the transgressor, the iniquitous, 12 Greedy therewithal, intrusive. 13 just because he has wealth and sons, 14 When Our Verses (of the Quran) are recited to him, he says: "Tales of the men of old!" 15 We shall mark him upon his nose! 16 We have put them [i.e., the Makkans] to test even as We put to test the owners of the orchard when they vowed that they would gather the fruit of their orchard in the morning, 17 And they did not say, “If Allah wills”. 18 Then a calamity from your Lord fell upon it, but they remained fast asleep. 19 So in the morning it became as if harvested. 20 In the morning they called to one another, 21 "Go ye to your tilth (betimes) in the morning, if ye would gather the fruits." 22 So they departed, whispering together, 23 Let there not enter upon you today any needy man. 24 – and early they went, strongly bent upon their purpose. 25 Then when they beheld it, they said: verily we have strayed. 26 nay, rather we have been robbed!' 27 Said the most right-minded among them: "Did I not tell you, 'Will you not extol God's limitless glory?'" 28 They said: Glory be to our Lord, surely we were unjust. 29 Then they began to heap reproaches on each other. 30 They said: “Woe to us! We had indeed transgressed. 31 It may be that our Lord will give us in exchange a better than it; to our Lord we humbly turn.' 32 Such is the punishment (in this life), but truly, the punishment of the Hereafter is greater, if they but knew. 33