Tell My bondmen to speak that which is kindlier. Lo! the devil soweth discord among them. Lo! the devil is for man an open foe. 53 Your Lord is fully aware of you. He may show you mercy if He will, or punish you if He will. We have not sent you as their guardian. 54 And your Lord knows well all those who are in the heavens and the earth; and indeed among the Prophets We gave excellence to some above others, and We gave the Zaboor to Dawud. 55 SAY: "Call upon those [beings] whom you imagine [to be endowed with divine powers] beside Him and [you will find that] they have it not in their power to remove any affliction from you, or to shift it [elsewhere]." 56 Those [saintly beings] whom they invoke are themselves striving to obtain their Sustainer's favour - [even] those among them who are closest [to Him] - hoping for His grace and dreading His chastisement: for, verily, thy Sustainer's chastisement is something to beware of! 57 And there is not a town but We will destroy it before the day of resurrection or chastise it with a severe chastisement; this is written in the Divine ordinance. 58 Nothing hindered Us from sending Our Signs except that the people of olden times rejected them as lies. We publicly sent the she-camel to the Thamud to open their eyes but they wronged her. We never send Our Signs except to cause people to fear. 59 We told you that your Lord encompasses mankind. We granted the vision which We showed you, as well as the tree that is cursed in the Quran, only as a test for mankind. We warn them, but this only increases their insolence. 60