or from producing you again in a form which ye know not!
Ye have known the first creation: will ye not then reflect?
What think ye? That which ye sow-
Is it ye who cause its upgrowth, or do we cause it to spring forth?
If we pleased we could so make your harvest dry and brittle that ye would ever marvel and say,
"Truly we have been at cost,15 yet are we forbidden harvest."
What think ye of the water ye drink?
Is it ye who send it down from the clouds, or send we it down?
Brackish could we make it, if we pleased: will ye not then be thankful?
What think ye? The fire which ye obtain by friction-
Is it ye who rear its tree, or do we rear it?
It is we who have made it for a memorial and a benefit to the wayfarers of the desert,
Praise therefore the name of thy Lord, the Great.
It needs not that I swear by the setting of the stars,
And it is a great oath, if ye knew it,
That this is the honourable Koran,
Written in the preserved Book:16
Let none touch it but the purified,17
It is a revelation from the Lord of the worlds.
Such tidings as these will ye disdain?
Will ye make it your daily bread to gainsay them?
Why, at the moment when the soul of a dying man shall come up into his throat,
And when ye are gazing at him,
Though we are nearer to him than ye, although ye see us not:-
Why do ye not, if ye are to escape the judgment,
Cause that soul to return? Tell me, if ye speak the truth.
But as to him who shall enjoy near access to God,
His shall be repose, and pleasure, and a garden of delights.
Yea, for him who shall be of the people of the right hand,
Shall be the greeting from the people of the right hand-"Peace be to thee."
But for him who shall be of those who treat the prophets as deceivers,
And of the erring,
His entertainment shall be of scalding water,
And the broiling of hell-fire.
Verily this is a certain truth:
Praise therefore the name of thy Lord, the Great.
1. The renderings of Mar. cum inciderit casura, or as in Sur. lxix, 15, ingruerit ingruens nearly express the peculiar force of the Arabic verb and of the noun formed from it; i.e. a calamity that falls suddenly and surely. Weil renders, ween der Auferstehung's Tag eintritt (p. 389). Lane, when the calamity shall have happened.
2. Comp. Tr. Rosch Haschanah, fol. 16, 6.
3. Lit., the companions of the right hand, what shall be the companions of the right hand! and thus in verses 9, 37, 40.
4. Lit., the preceders, the preceders.
5. See Sura liii. 14, p. 69.
6. Probably the banana according to others, the acacia gummifera.
7. "A Muslim of some learning professed to me that he considered the descriptions of Paradise in the Koran to be, in a great measure, figurative; 'like those,' said he, 'in the book of the Revelation of St. John;' and he assured me that many learned Muslims were of the same opinion." Lane's Modern Egyptians, i. p. 75, note.
8. Like them, grow not old.
9. This seems a direct contradiction to verse 14, unless we suppose with Beidhawi that an inferior and more numerous class of believers are here spoken of.
10. Or, scorching.
11. Lit., not noble, agreeable in appearance.
12. As to the resurrection.
13. Lit., semen quod emittitis.
14. Lit., forestalled, anticipated.
15. Lit, have incurred debt.
16. That is, The Prototype of the Koran written down in the Book kept by God himself.
17. This passage implies the existence of copies of portions at least of the Koran in common use. It was quoted by the sister of Omar when at his conversion be desired to take her copy of Sura xx. into his hands.
SURA1 XLVI. THE STAR
MECCA.-62 Verses
In the Name of God, the Compassionate, the Merciful
By the STAR when it setteth,
Your compatriot erreth not, nor is he led astray,
Neither speaketh he from mere impulse.
The Koran is no other than a revelation revealed to him:
One terrible in power2 taught it him,
Endued with wisdom. With even balance stood he
In the highest part of the horizon:
Then came he nearer and approached,
And was at the distance of two bows, or even closer,-
And he revealed to his servant what he revealed.
His heart falsified not what he saw.
What! will ye then dispute with him as to what he saw?
He had seen him also another time,