۞ SAY: "Would you indeed deny Him who has created the earth in two aeons? And do you claim that there is any power that could rival Him, the Sustainer of all the worlds?" 9 For He [it is who, after creating the earth,] placed firm mountains on it, [towering] above its surface, and bestowed [so many] blessings on it, and equitably apportioned its means of subsistence to all who would seek it: [and all this He created] in four aeons. 10 Then turned He to the heaven when it was smoke, and said unto it and unto the earth: Come both of you, willingly or loth. They said: We come, obedient. 11 And He [it is who] decreed that they become seven heavens in two aeons, and imparted unto each heaven its function. And We adorned the skies nearest to the earth with lights, and made them secure: such is the ordaining of the Almighty, the All-Knowing. 12 If they ignore (your message), tell them, "I have warned you against a destructive blast of sound like that which struck the people of `Ad and Thamud. 13 Behold, the messengers came to them, from before them and behind them, (preaching): "Serve none but Allah." They said, "If our Lord had so pleased, He would certainly have sent down angels (to preach). Now we reject your mission (altogether)." 14 As for 'Ad, they were arrogant in the land without right, and they said: "Who is mightier than us in strength?" See they not that Allah, Who created them was mightier in strength than them. And they used to deny Our Ayat (proofs, evidences, verses, lessons, revelations, etc.)! 15 Then We loosed against them a wind clamorous in days of ill fortune, that We might let them taste the chastisement of degradation in the present life; and the chastisement of the world to come is even more degrading, and they shall not be helped. 16 And as for the tribe of the Thamud We guided them but they preferred blindness to the guidance, wherefore the bolt of the torment of abjection laid hold of them because of that which they had been earning. 17 And We delivered those who believed and had been fearing. 18