۞ Say, "What! Do you indeed deny Him who created the earth in two Days [periods] and do you set up equals with Him? He is the Lord of the Universe." 9 He placed therein (i.e. the earth) firm mountains from above it, and He blessed it, and measured therein its sustenance (for its dwellers) in four Days equal (i.e. all these four 'days' were equal in the length of time), for all those who ask (about its creation). 10 Then turned He to the heaven when it was smoke, and said unto it and unto the earth: Come both of you, willingly or loth. They said: We come, obedient. 11 Then He ordained them seven heavens in two Days and inspired in each heaven its mandate; and We decked the nether heaven with lamps, and rendered it inviolable. That is the measuring of the Mighty, the Knower. 12 And We adorned the lower heaven with lamps, and to reserve; that is the ordaining of the All-mighty, the All-knowing. But if they turn away, then say, 'I warn you of a thunderbolt like to the thunderbolt of Ad and Thamood.' 13 When the Messengers came to them, from before them and behind them (saying): "Worship none but Allah" They said: "If our Lord had so willed, He would surely have sent down the angels. So indeed! We disbelieve in that with which you have been sent." 14 As for Aad, they behaved proudly in the earth without right. 'Who is stronger than us?' they would say. Could they not see that Allah, who created them, is stronger than they? But they disbelieved Our signs. 15 So We sent on them a furious wind in unlucky days, that We may make them taste the chastisement of abasement in this world's life; and certainly the chastisement of the hereafter is much more abasing, and they shall not be helped. 16 As to the Thamud, We gave them Guidance, but they preferred blindness (of heart) to Guidance: so the stunning Punishment of humiliation seized them, because of what they had earned. 17 Yet We delivered those who believed and were God-fearing. 18