As for those of your women who are guilty of lewdness, call to witness four of you against them. And if they testify (to the truth of the allegation) then confine them to the houses until death take them or (until) Allah appoint for them a way (through new legislation). 15 If two (men) among you are guilty of such acts then punish both of them. But if they repent and reform, let them be, for God accepts repentance and is merciful. 16 God does accept repentance, but only of those who are guilty of an evil out of ignorance yet quickly repent, and God turns to them again, for God is all-knowing and all-wise. 17 (Allah will accept) no repentance from those who do evil deeds until death comes to one of them, he says: 'Now I repent' Nor those who die unbelieving. For those We have prepared a painful punishment. 18 Believers, it is unlawful for you to inherit women forcefully, neither bar them, in order that you go off with part of what you have given them, except when they commit a clear indecency. Live with them honorably. If you hate them, it may be that you hate something which Allah has set in it much good. 19 And if you wish to change one wife for another and you have given her heaps of treasure, do not take back anything from it; will you take it back by slander and open sin? 20 How can you take it when you have been intimate with one another, and she has taken a solemn pledge from you? 21 And do not marry women your fathers married unless it is a thing of the past; surely that was an indecency, hated, and a way of evil. 22