۞ Virtue does not consist in whether you face towards the East or the West; virtue means believing in God, the Last Day, the angels, the Book and the prophets; the virtuous are those who, despite their love for it, give away their wealth to their relatives and to orphans and the very poor, and to travellers and those who ask [for charity], and to set slaves free, and who attend to their prayers and pay the alms, and who keep their pledges when they make them, and show patience in hardship and adversity, and in times of distress. Such are the true believers; and such are the God-fearing. 177 O believers, prescribed for you is retaliation, touching the slain; freeman for freeman, slave for slave, female for female. But if aught is pardoned a man by his brother, let the pursuing be honourable, and let the payment be with kindliness. That is a lightening granted you by your Lord, and a mercy; and for him who commits aggression after that -- for him there awaits a painful chastisement. 178 for, in [the law of] just retribution, O you who are endowed with insight, there is life for you, so that you might remain conscious of God! 179 It is prescribed, when death approaches any of you, if he leave any goods that he make a bequest to parents and next of kin, according to reasonable usage; this is due from the Allah-fearing. 180 Then whosoever altereth it after he hath heard it, the sin thereof shall be only on those who shall alter it; verily Allah is Hearing, Knowing. 181 He who fears injustice or sin on the part of a testator and brings about a settlement among the parties incurs no guilt. Allah is the Forgiver and the Most Merciful. 182