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 shall by no means harm you but with a slight evil; and if they fight with you they shall turn (their) backs to you, then shall they not be helped. 111 Wherever they were, they were covered with ignominy, except when they were protected by either a covenant with Allah or a covenant with men. They are laden with the burden of Allah's wrath, and humiliation is stuck upon them - and all this because they rejected the signs of Allah and slayed the Prophets without right, and because they disobeyed and transgressed. 112 ۞ They are not all alike. Of the People of the Scripture there is a staunch community who recite the revelations of Allah in the night season, falling prostrate (before Him). 113 They believe in Allah and the last day, and they enjoin what is right and forbid the wrong and they strive with one another in hastening to good deeds, and those are among the good. 114 And whatever good they do, they shall never be denied the reward thereof: for, God has full knowledge of those who are conscious of Him. 115 [But,] behold, as for those who are bent on denying the truth - neither their worldly possessions nor their children will in the least avail them against God: and it is they who are destined for the fire, therein to abide. 116 The example of what they spend in the life of this world is like that of a wind accompanied with frost which smites the harvest of a people who wronged themselves, and lays it to waste. It is not Allah who wronged them; rather it is they who wrong 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 Lo! It is you who love them but they do not love you even though you believe in the whole of the (heavenly) Book. When they meet you they say: 'We believe', but when they are by themselves they bite their fingers in rage at you. Say: 'Perish in your rage.' Allah knows even what lies hidden in their breasts. 119 When you are touched with good fortune, they grieve, but when evil befalls you, they rejoice. If you are patient and cautious, their guile will never harm you. Allah encompasses what they do. 120