O believers, if you follow the path shown by God, He will give you a standard (of right and wrong), and overlook your sins, and forgive you. God is abounding in benevolence. 29 And recall what time those who disbelieved were plotting against thee to confine thee or to slay thee or to drive thee forth: they were plotting and Allah was plotting, and Allah is the Best of plotters. 30 Whenever Our revelations are recited to them, they say, "We have heard them. If we wished, we could produce the like. They are nothing but the fables of the ancients." 31 And lo, they would say: "O God! If this be indeed the truth from Thee, then rain down upon us stones from the skies, or inflict [some other] grievous suffering on us!" 32 But Allah would not punish them while you, [O Muhammad], are among them, and Allah would not punish them while they seek forgiveness. 33 Yet why should God not punish them when they debar people from the Sacred Mosque, although they are not its guardians? Its rightful guardians are those who fear God, though most of them do not realize it. 34 Their prayer at the House (of Allah) is nothing but whistling and clapping of hands: (Its only answer can be), "Taste ye the penalty because ye blasphemed." 35 Those who disbelieve spend their possessions on turning men away from God. They will go on spending and rue it in the end, and will be subdued. But those who remain disbelievers shall be gathered into Hell 36 That God may separate the bad from the good, and link the wicked together and cast them into Hell. These are verily the people who will lose. 37