THE CHAPTER OF THE INFORMATION
(LXXVIII. Mecca.)
IN the name of the merciful and compassionate God. Of what do they ask each other?-Of the mighty information whereon they do dispute? nay, they shall know too well! Again, nay, they shall know too well!
Have we not set the earth as a couch, and the mountains as stakes, and created you in pairs, and made your sleep for rest, and made the night a garment, and made the day for livelihood, and built above you seven solid (heavens) and set a burning lamp, and sent down from the rain expressing clouds water pouring forth, to bring out thereby the grain and herb and gardens thickly planted? Verily, the day of decision is an appointed time; and the day when the trumpet shall be blown, and ye shall come in troops, and the heavens shall be opened, and shall be all doors, and the mountains shall be moved, and shall be like a mirage!
Verily, hell is an ambuscade; a reward for the outrageous, to tarry therein for ages. They shall not taste therein cool nor drink, but only boiling water and pus;-a fit reward!
Verily, they did not hope for the account; but they ever said our signs were lies.
Everything have we remembered in a book.
Then taste, for we will only increase your torment!' Verily, for the pious is a blissful place,-gardens and vineyards, and girls with swelling breasts of the same age as themselves, and a brimming cup; they shall hear therein no folly and no lie;-a reward from thy Lord, a sufficient gift! The Lord of the heavens and the earth, and what is between them both,-the Merciful,-they cannot obtain audience of Him!
The day when the Spirit and the angels shall stand in ranks, they shall not speak save to whom the Merciful permits, and who speaks aright.
That is the true day; and whoso pleases let him take to a resort unto his Lord!
Verily, we have warned you of a torment that is nigh: on a day when man shall see what his two hands have sent forward; and the misbeliever shall say, 'Would that I were dust!'