۞ Say: 'What, do you disbelieve in Him who created the earth in two days, and do you set up compeers to Him? That is the Lord of all Being. 9 (After creating the earth) He set up firm mountains on it, blessed it, and provided it with sustenance in proportion to the needs of all who seek (sustenance). All this was done in four days. 10 And He [it is who] applied His design to the skies, which were [yet but] smoke; and He [it is who] said to them and to the earth, "Come [into being,] both of you, willingly or unwillingly!" - to which both responded, "We do come in obedience." 11 So He determined them as seven heavens in two days, and revealed its commandment in every heaven.' 12 If they turn away, then say, "I warn you of a lightning-bolt like the one which struck the 'Ad and the Thamud: 13 When their Noble Messengers approached them from front and from behind saying, "Do not worship any one except Allah"; they said, "If our Lord willed, He would surely have sent down angels – we therefore deny whatever you have been sent with.” 14 As for Ad, they waxed proud in the land without justification and said: “Who is greater than we in strength?” Did they not see that Allah, Who created them, is greater in strength than they? They continued to deny Our Signs, 15 so We let loose upon them a raging wind over several inauspicious days, so that We might make them taste the torment of humiliation in the life of this world, and surely the torment of the Hereafter will be more humiliating. They shall have none to help them. 16 And as for [the tribe of] Thamud, We offered them guidance, but they chose blindness in preference to guidance: and so the thunderbolt of shameful suffering fell upon them as an outcome of all [the evil] that they had wrought; 17 And We delivered those who believed and used to keep their duty to Allah. 18