The Pen (Al-Qalam)
In the name of Allah, the Beneficent, the Merciful
۞ Noon. By the Pen and that (the angels) write, 1 you are not, because of the favor of your Lord, mad. 2 You will certainly receive a never-ending reward. 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 Indeed, your Lord is most knowing of who has gone astray from His way, and He is most knowing of the [rightly] guided. 7 Wherefore obey not thou the beliers. 8 they would wish you to be pliant so that they too may be pliant. 9 And yield not to any mean swearer 10 [or to] the slanderer that goes about with defaming tales, 11 Hinderer of the good, transgressor, sinful, 12 the coarse-grained, and above all mean and ignoble; 13 Simply because he possesses wealth and children. 14 When Our verses are recited to him, he says, “These are stories of earlier people.” 15 Anon We shall brand him on snout. 16 Surely We will try them as We tried the owners of the garden, when they swore that they would certainly cut off the produce in the morning, 17 and made no allowance [for the will of God]: 18 Then there came on the (garden) a visitation from thy Lord, (which swept away) all around, while they were asleep. 19 And by morning it lay as if it had already been harvested, a barren land. 20 So they called out to each other at the break of dawn, 21 “Hurry to your orchard if you would gather its fruit.” 22 And so they departed, whispering to one another: 23 "Be sure to stop any poor person from entering the orchard today." 24 And in the morning they went, having the power to prevent. 25 But when they saw it, they said: Lo! we are in error! 26 Nay! we are made to suffer privation. 27 A reasonable one among them said, "Did I not tell you that you should glorify God?" 28 "Glory to our Lord," they said; we were really in the wrong." 29 So they came towards each other, blaming. 30 They said, “Woe to us – we were indeed rebellious.” 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 was the punishment. And verily the punishment of the Hereafter is greater if they did but know. 33