۞ O YOU who have attained to faith! Be ever steadfast in upholding equity, bearing witness to the truth for the sake of God, even though it be against your own selves or your parents and kinsfolk. Whether the person concerned be rich or poor, God's claim takes precedence over [the claims of] either of them. Do not, then, follow your own desires, lest you swerve from justice: for if you distort [the truth,] behold, God is indeed aware of all that you do! 135 Believers, believe in God and His Messenger and in the Scripture He sent down to His Messenger, as well as what He sent down before. He who denies God, His angels, His Scriptures, His messengers and the Last Day has surely gone far astray. 136 Those who believe, then reject faith, then believe (again) and (again) reject faith, and go on increasing in unbelief,- Allah will not forgive them nor guide them nor guide them on the way. 137 Bear unto the hypocrites the tidings that for them there is a painful doom; 138 Those who take unbelievers for their friends instead of believers -- do they seek glory in them? But glory altogether belongs to God. 139 Already has He sent you Word in the Book, that when ye hear the signs of Allah held in defiance and ridicule, ye are not to sit with them unless they turn to a different theme: if ye did, ye would be like them. For Allah will collect the hypocrites and those who defy faith - all in Hell:- 140 Those who wait to see what befalls you, say in ease success comes to you from God: "Were we not with you?" But if fortune favours the infidels, they say: "Did we not overpower you, and yet protected you against the believers?" But God will judge between you on the Day of Resurrection; and God will never give the unbelievers a way over the faithful. 141