AND, INDEED, [long before Muhammad] We vouchsafed revelation unto Moses, and appointed his brother Aaron to help him to bear his burden; 35 Then We said: Go you both to the people who rejected Our communications; so We destroyed them with utter destruction. 36 And the people of Noah,- when they rejected the messengers, We drowned them, and We made them as a Sign for mankind; and We have prepared for (all) wrong-doers a grievous Penalty;- 37 to 'Ad, and Thamud, and the people of al-Rass, and as We did for the many a generation between them. 38 to each of them We gave examples, and each of them We utterly ruined. 39 And certainly they have (often) passed by the town on which was rained an evil rain; did they not then see it? Nay! they did not hope to be raised again. 40 When they see you they take you only in jest: "Is this the one whom God has sent as messenger? 41 Indeed, he would well-nigh have led us astray from our deities, had we not been [so] steadfastly attached to them!" But in time, when they see the suffering [that awaits them,] they will come to know who it was that went farthest astray from the path [of truth]! 42 Have you seen him who has taken his own desire to be his god? Can you be a guardian over him? 43 Or deemest thou that most of them hear or understand? They are but like unto the cattle; nay, they are even farther astray from the path. 44