The Pen (Al-Qalam)
In the name of Allah, the Beneficent, the Merciful
۞ Nun. By the pen, and all that they write! 1 You (O Muhammad SAW) are not, by the Grace of your Lord, a madman. 2 And most surely you shall have a reward never to be cut off. 3 surely thou art upon a mighty morality. 4 So you shall see, and they (too) shall see, 5 which of you is afflicted with madness. 6 Verily, your Lord knows better, who (among men) has gone astray from His Path, and He knows better those who are guided. 7 Wherefore obey not thou the beliers. 8 Their desire is that thou shouldst be pliant: so would they be pliant. 9 And do not obey every mean swearer, 10 Or backbiter, calumniator, slanderer, 11 obstructing virtues, a sinful transgressor, 12 Ignoble, besides all that, base-born; 13 because he has wealth and sons. 14 When Our Verses (of the Quran) are recited to him, he says: "Tales of the men of old!" 15 We shall brand him on his nose. 16 Verily We! We have proved them even as We proved the fellows of a garden when they sware that they would surely reap it in the morning. 17 And they did not say, “If Allah wills”. 18 Then, a visitation from your Lord came down upon it while they slept, 19 So by the morning it seemed as though picked clean. 20 And they cried out one unto another in the morning, 21 “Hurry to your orchard if you would gather its fruit.” 22 So they set out, while lowering their voices, 23 No Miskin (poor man) shall enter upon you into it today. 24 They left early in the morning bent on this purpose. 25 But as soon as they beheld the orchard, (they cried out): “We have certainly lost the way; 26 [and then,] "Nay, but we have been rendered destitute!" 27 Said the most moderate of them, 'Did I not say to you, "Why do you not give glory?"' 28 They said, “Purity is to our Lord – we have indeed been unjust.” 29 Then they turned, one against another, in blaming. 30 They said, "Alas for us, our behaviour was beyond the pale. 31 Maybe our Lord will give us a better orchard in its place; to our Lord do we penitently turn.” 32 Such was the punishment. And verily the punishment of the Hereafter is greater if they did but know. 33