Or has He taken to Himself, from that He creates, daughters, and favoured you with sons? 16 When any of them is given the news of the very thing [i.e. a female child] which he himself has ascribed to the All Merciful, his face darkens and he is filled with grief -- 17 ["Do you ascribe to God] one who is brought up among ornaments and who cannot produce a cogent argument?" 18 And they make the angels-- them who are the servants of the Beneficent Allah-- female (divinities). What! did they witness their creation? Their evidence shall be written down and they shall be questioned. 19 And they say: If the Beneficent One had (so) willed, we should not have worshipped them. They have no knowledge whatsoever of that. They do but guess. 20 Did We give them a Scripture before this to which they are holding fast? 21 Nay! they say: "We found our fathers following a certain religion, and we do guide ourselves by their footsteps." 22 Even so We sent never before thee any warner into any city, except that its men who lived at ease said, 'We indeed found our fathers upon a community, and we are following upon their traces.' 23 ۞ (And the warner) said: What! Even though I bring you better guidance than that ye found your fathers following? They answered: Lo! in what ye bring we are disbelievers. 24 So We inflicted retribution on them, then see how was the end of the rejecters. 25