The Pen (Al-Qalam)
In the Name of God, the Merciful, the Compassionate
۞ Nun. By the pen and by that which they inscribe. 1 Thou art not, through the grace of thy Lord, mad. 2 And verily thine shall be a hire unending. 3 And lo! thou art of a tremendous nature. 4 You shall see and they will see 5 Which of you is afflicted with madness. 6 Surely thy Lord knows very well those who have gone astray from His way, and He knows very well those who are guided. 7 So obey thou not those who cry lies. 8 Their desire is that thou shouldst be pliant: so would they be pliant. 9 Neither obey thou each feeble oath-monger, 10 A slanderer, going about with calumnies, 11 hinderer of good, guilty aggressor, coarse-grained, 12 [or] one who is cruel, by greed possessed, and in addition to all this, utterly useless [to his fellow-men]. 13 (who so acts) simply 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 will brand him on the 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 Without making exception. 18 Then there passed by on the (garden) something (fire) from your Lord at night and burnt it while they were asleep. 19 So by the morning it seemed as though picked clean. 20 In the morning they called out to one another, 21 [Saying], "Go early to your crop if you would cut the fruit." 22 So they departed, conversing in secret low tones (saying), 23 'No needy man shall enter it today against your will.' 24 And they went in the morning with strong intention, thinking that they have power (to prevent the poor taking anything of the fruits therefrom). 25 But when they saw it, they said, "We must have lost our way. 26 “In fact, we are unfortunate.” 27 The more upright of the two said, "Did I not bid you to glorify God?" 28 They cried out: “Glory be to our Lord! Certainly we were sinners.” 29 Then some of them drew near unto others, self-reproaching. 30 They said: woe unto us! verily we! we have been arrogant. 31 "It may be that our Lord will give us in exchange a better (garden) than this: for we do turn to Him (in repentance)!" 32 Such is the chastisement; and the chastisement of the world to come, is assuredly greater, did they but know. 33