The Pen (Al-Qalam)
Allah - beginning with the name of - the Most Gracious, the Most Merciful
۞ Nun. By the Pen, and what they inscribe, 1 By your Lord's Grace, you are not afflicted with madness, 2 and surely yours shall be a never-ending reward, 3 And indeed, you are of a great moral character. 4 Soon wilt thou see, and they will see, 5 which of you was bereft of reason. 6 Your Lord knows best who has fallen by the wayside, and who has remained on the true path. 7 So do not yield to the rejecters. 8 They only want that you should relent, so that they may come to terms. 9 Neither obey thou each feeble oath-monger, 10 A slanderer, going about with calumnies, 11 [or] the withholder of good, [or] the sinful aggressor, 12 Ignoble, besides all that, base-born; 13 because he has wealth and sons. 14 When Our verses are recited to him, he says: 'They are but fairytales of the ancients' 15 We will brand him upon the snout. 16 We have tried them as we tried the owners of a certain orchard, who vowed to harvest all its fruits the next morning, 17 and made no allowance [for the will of God]: 18 Then a visitation from thy Lord visited it, while they were sleeping, 19 and so by morning the orchard lay as though it had been fully harvested. 20 As the morning broke, they called out, one to another,- 21 Saying: Go early to your tilth if you would cut (the produce). 22 So they departed, conversing in secret low tones (saying), 23 No Miskin (poor man) shall enter upon you into it today. 24 And they went in the morning with strong intention, thinking that they have power (to prevent the poor taking anything of the fruits therefrom). 25 But when they saw the (garden), they said: "Verily, we have gone astray," 26 (No, we are not lost.) In fact, we have been deprived of everything". 27 The best among them said, “Did I not tell you, ‘Why do you not proclaim His purity?’” 28 They said, “Purity is to our Lord – we have indeed been unjust.” 29 Then some of them advanced against others, blaming each other. 30 They said, "O woe to us; indeed we were transgressors. 31 Perhaps our Lord will substitute for us [one] better than it. Indeed, we are toward our Lord desirous." 32 Such is the punishment; and indeed the punishment of the Hereafter is the greatest, if only they knew! 33