۞ O YOU who have attained to faith! Be ever steadfast in upholding equity, bearing witness to the truth for the sake of God, even though it be against your own selves or your parents and kinsfolk. Whether the person concerned be rich or poor, God's claim takes precedence over [the claims of] either of them. Do not, then, follow your own desires, lest you swerve from justice: for if you distort [the truth,] behold, God is indeed aware of all that you do! 135 O you who believe! believe in Allah and His Apostle and the Book which He has revealed to His Apostle and the Book which He revealed before; and whoever disbelieves in Allah and His angels and His apostles and the last day, he indeed strays off into a remote error. 136 As for those who come to believe, and then deny the truth, and again come to believe, and again deny the truth, and thereafter grow stubborn in their denial of the truth -- God will never forgive them, nor will He guide them. 137 Give to the hypocrites the tidings that there is for them a painful torment. 138 As for those who take the deniers of the truth for their allies rather than the believers -- do they seek honour in their company? Surely all honour belongs to God. 139 He has sent down upon you in the Book: 'When you hear God's signs being disbelieved and made mock of, do not sit with them until they plunge into some other talk, or else you will surely be like to them.' God will gather the hypocrites and the unbelievers all in Gehenna. 140 who but wait to see what betides you: thus, if triumph comes to you from God, they say: "Were we not on your side?" - whereas if those who deny the truth are in luck, they say [to them,] "Have we not earned your affection by defending you against those believers?'' But God will judge between you all on the Day of Resurrection; and never will God allow those who deny the truth to harm the believers. 141