(Muhammad), ask them about the (people of the) towns on the seashore. They had transgressed by catching fish on the Sabbath. Each Sabbath the fish came openly within their reach but not so on other days. Thus, We were testing them because of their evil deeds. 163 When some of them asked, "Why do you admonish a people whom God is going to destroy or to afflict with a severe punishment?" They answered, "In order to be free from blame before your Lord, and that they may perhaps fear Him." 164 And when they forgot that whereof they had been reminded, We rescued those who forbade wrong, and visited those who did wrong with dreadful punishment because they were evil-livers. 165 So when they took pride in that which they had been forbidden, We said unto them: Be ye apes despised and loathed! 166 And when your Lord announced that He would certainly send against them to the day of resurrection those who would subject them to severe torment; most surely your Lord is quick to requite (evil) and most surely He is Forgiving, Merciful. 167 And We have broken them (i.e. the Jews) up into various separate groups on the earth, some of them are righteous and some are away from that. And We tried them with good (blessings) and evil (calamities) in order that they might turn (to Allah's Obedience). 168 Then after them succeeded an (evil) generation, which inherited the Book, but they chose (for themselves) the goods of this low life (evil pleasures of this world) saying (as an excuse): "(Everything) will be forgiven to us." And if (again) the offer of the like (evil pleasures of this world) came their way, they would (again) seize them (would commit those sins). Was not the covenant of the Book taken from them that they would not say about Allah anything but the truth? And they have studied what is in it (the Book). And the home of the Hereafter is better for those who are Al-Muttaqun (the pious - see V. 2:2). Do not you then understand? 169 And those who hold fast to the Book, and have kept the prayer established; and We do not waste the wages of the righteous. 170 ۞ And when We shook the mountain over them as if it were a covering overhead, and they thought that it was going to fall down upon them: Take hold of what We have given you with firmness, and be mindful of what is in it, so that you may guard (against evil). 171