The Cave (Al-Kahf)
In the name of Allah, the Entirely Merciful, the Especially Merciful
Praise belongs to God who has sent down upon His servant the Book and has not assigned unto it any crookedness; 1 [a divine writ] unerringly straight, meant to warn [the godless] of a severe punishment from Him, and to give unto the believers who do good works the glad tiding that theirs shall be a goodly reward 2 Wherein they will abide for ever; 3 And to warn those who say “Allah has chosen a child.” 4 They have no knowledge of it, nor had their fathers; a grievous word it is that comes out of their mouths; they speak nothing but a lie. 5 (O Muhammad), if they do not believe in this Message, you will perhaps torment yourself to death with grief, sorrowing over them. 6 Behold, We have willed that all beauty on earth be a means by which We put men to a test, [showing] which of them are best in conduct; 7 We will surely reduce all that is on it to barren dust. 8 [AND SINCE the life of this world is but a test, dost thou [really] think that [the parable of] the Men of the Cave and of [their devotion to] the scriptures could be deemed more wondrous than any [other] of Our messages? 9 When the young men fled for refuge to the Cave and said: Our Lord! Give us mercy from Thy presence, and shape for us right conduct in our plight. 10 So We prevented them from hearing in the cave for a number of years. 11 Then We awakened them that We might show which of the two factions was most precise in calculating what [extent] they had remained in time. 12