YOU ARE indeed the best community that has ever been brought forth for [the good of] mankind: you enjoin the doing of what is right and forbid the doing of what is wrong, and you believe in God. Now if the followers of earlier revelation had attained to [this kind of] faith, it would have been for their own good; [but only few] among them are believers, while most of them are iniquitous: 110 They will not be able to harm you except for a little hurt, and if they fight against you they will turn their backs (in flight), and then they will not be succoured. 111 They have been put under humiliation [by Allah] wherever they are overtaken, except for a covenant from Allah and a rope from the Muslims. And they have drawn upon themselves anger from Allah and have been put under destitution. That is because they disbelieved in the verses of Allah and killed the prophets without right. That is because they disobeyed and [habitually] transgressed. 112 ۞ Yet all are not alike: among the People of the Book there are upright people who recite the messages of Allah in the watches of the night and prostrate themselves in worship. 113 who believe in Allah and the Last Day, who order honor and forbid dishonor and race in good works. These are the righteous. 114 And whatever good they do, nothing will be rejected of them; for Allah knows well those who are Al-Muttaqun (the pious - see V. 2:2). 115 As for those who disbelieve, neither their riches nor their children shall help them a thing from Allah. They are the people of the Fire, and there they shall remain for ever. 116 The parable of what they spend on the life of this world is that of an icy wind which smites the tilth of people who have sinned against themselves, and destroys it: for, it is not God who does them wrong, but it is they who are wronging themselves. 117 O ye who believe! Take not for intimates others than your own folk, who would spare no pains to ruin you; they love to hamper you. Hatred is revealed by (the utterance of) their mouths, but that which their breasts hide is greater. We have made plain for you the revelations if ye will understand. 118 Ha, there you are; you love them, and they love you not; you believe in the Book, all of it, and when they meet you they say, 'We believe,' but when they go privily, they bite at you their fingers, enraged. Say: 'Die in your rage; God knows the thoughts in the breasts.' 119 If a lucky chance befall you, it is evil unto them, and if disaster strike you they rejoice thereat. But if ye persevere and keep from evil their guile will never harm you. Lo! Allah is Surrounding what they do. 120