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 when the unbelievers were devising against thee, to confine thee, or slay thee, or to expel thee, and were devising, and God was devising; and God is the best of devisers. 30 And when Our communications are recited to them, they say: We have heard indeed; if we pleased we could say the like of it; this is nothing but the stories of the ancients. 31 Remember how they said: "O Allah if this is indeed the Truth from Thee, rain down on us a shower of stones form the sky, or send us a grievous penalty." 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 And what aileth them that Allah should not chastise them when they are hindering people from the Sacred Mosque, whereas they are not even the keepers thereof - its keepers are none but the God-fearing - but most of them know not. 34 and their prayers before the Temple are nothing but whistling and clapping of hands. Taste then, [O unbelievers,] this chastisement as an outcome of your persistent denial of the truth! 35 Those who are bent on denying the truth are spending their wealth in debarring others from the path of God. They will continue to spend it in this way till, in the end, this spending will become a source of intense regret for them, and then they will be overcome. And those who denied the truth will be gathered together in 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