Repentance (At-Tawba)
۞ An acquittal, from God and His Messenger, unto the idolaters with whom you made covenant: 1 'For four months you shall journey freely in the land. But know that you shall not render Allah incapable, and that Allah will humiliate the unbelievers' 2 A proclamation, from God and His Messenger, unto mankind on the day of the Greater Pilgrimage: 'God is quit, and His Messenger, of the idolaters. So if you repent, that will be better for you; but if you turn your backs; know that you cannot frustrate the will of God. And give thou good tidings to the unbelievers of a painful chastisement; 3 Other than those polytheists with whom you had a treaty, and they have not diminished anything from your treaty nor supported anyone against you – therefore fulfil their treaty up to the appointed term; indeed Allah befriends the pious. 4 When the forbidden months have passed, kill the polytheists [who are at war with you] wherever you find them. Take them captive, and besiege them, and lie in wait for them at every place of ambush. But if they repent, and take to prayer regularly and pay the alms, then let them go their way. God is forgiving and merciful. 5 And if anyone of the Mushrikun (polytheists, idolaters, pagans, disbelievers in the Oneness of Allah) seeks your protection then grant him protection, so that he may hear the Word of Allah (the Quran), and then escort him to where he can be secure, that is because they are men who know not. 6