But for a pre-ordained Word from your Lord, and a term [of respite] already fixed, immediate punishment would inevitably have taken place. 129 So be patient with anything they may say and glorify your Lord with His praise before the rising of the sun and before its setting; and glorify Him in the hours of the night and at the beginning and end of the day, so that you may find comfort. 130 Do not covet what We have granted myriads of people of the pomp and glitter of this world to tempt them. The means your Lord has given you are better far and more enduring. 131 And enjoin prayer on your followers, and steadily adhere to it; We do not ask you for subsistence; We do give you subsistence, and the (good) end is for guarding (against evil). 132 NOW THEY [who are blind to the truth] are wont to say: "If [Muhammad] would but produce for us a miracle from his Sustainer! [But] has there not come unto them a clear evidence [of the truth of this divine writ] in what is [to be found] in the earlier scriptures? 133 Had We destroyed them with a punishment before this, they would have said: 'Our Lord, why did You not send us a Messenger so that we could have followed Your verses before we were humiliated and degraded' 134 Say: "Each one (of us) is waiting: wait ye, therefore, and soon shall ye know who it is that is on the straight and even way, and who it is that has received Guidance." 135