Tell My bondmen to speak that which is kindlier. Lo! the devil soweth discord among them. Lo! the devil is for man an open foe. 53 Your Lord is most knowing of you. If He wills, He will have mercy upon you; or if He wills, He will punish you. And We have not sent you, [O Muhammad], over them as a manager. 54 Your Lord knows whoever is in the heavens and the earth. We exalted some of the prophets over the others; and to David We gave the Book of Psalms. 55 Say: "Call those whom you imagine to be gods besides Him; yet they have no power to relieve you of any distress or to avert it." 56 Those whom they invoke seek means of access to their Lord, [striving as to] which of them would be nearest, and they hope for His mercy and fear His punishment. Indeed, the punishment of your Lord is ever feared. 57 The decree that all the towns were to be destroyed or afflicted with severe punishment was already written in the Book before the Day of Judgment. 58 And We refrain from sending the signs, only because the men of former generations treated them as false: We sent the she-camel to the Thamud to open their eyes, but they treated her wrongfully: We only send the Signs by way of terror (and warning from evil). 59 And (remember) when We told you: "Verily! Your Lord has encompassed mankind (i.e. they are in His Grip)." And We made not the vision which we showed you (O Muhammad as an actual eye-witness and not as a dream on the night of Al-Isra') but a trial for mankind, and likewise the accursed tree (Zaqqum, mentioned) in the Quran. We warn and make them afraid but it only increases them in naught save great disbelief, oppression and disobedience to Allah. 60