The Pen (Al-Qalam)
In the Name of Allah, the Most Beneficent, the Most Merciful
۞ Nun. By the pen, and all that they write! 1 By the grace of your Lord, you are not a mad man. 2 There is surely reward unending for you, 3 for, behold, thou keepest indeed to a sublime way of life; 4 So you shall see, and they (too) shall see, 5 Which of you is the demented. 6 Your Lord knows best who has gone astray from His path and who is rightly guided. 7 Therefore, do not obey those who belie, 8 Their desire is that thou shouldst be pliant: so would they be pliant. 9 And yield not to any mean swearer 10 back-biting, gossiping, 11 the hinderer of good, the transgressor, the sinful; 12 Ignoble, besides all that, base-born; 13 just because he has wealth and sons, 14 When you recite Our revelations to him, he says: "These are fables of long ago." 15 We shall mark him upon his nose! 16 [As for such sinners,] behold, We [but] try them as We tried the owners of a certain garden who vowed that they would surely harvest its fruit on the morrow, 17 and made no allowance [for the will of God]: 18 whereupon a visitation for thy Sustainer came upon that [garden] while they were asleep, 19 So in the morning it became as if harvested. 20 (Then) in the morning they called out to one another, saying: 21 "If you want to gather the fruits, let us go early to the plantation." 22 They all left, whispering to one another, 23 “No destitute person shall enter it today.” 24 And they went out betimes determined in purpose. 25 But when they saw it they said: 'We have surely gone astray. 26 (No, we are not lost.) In fact, we have been deprived of everything". 27 The best among them said: Said I not unto you: Why glorify ye not (Allah)? 28 They said: "Glory to our Lord! Verily we have been doing wrong!" 29 Then they began to reproach one another. 30 [In the end] they said: "Oh, woe unto us! Verily, we did behave outrageously! 31 It may be that our Lord will give us better than this in place thereof. Lo! we beseech our Lord. 32 Such is the punishment (in this life), but truly, the punishment of the Hereafter is greater, if they but knew. 33