۞ God is the light of the heavens and the earth. His light may be compared to a niche containing a lamp, the lamp inside a crystal of star-like brilliance lit from a blessed olive tree, neither of the east nor of the west. The [luminous] oil is as if ready to burn without even touching it. Light upon light; God guides to His light whom He will. God draws such comparisons for mankind; God has full knowledge of everything. 35 in temples God has allowed to be raised up, and His Name to be commemorated therein; therein glorifying Him, in the mornings and the evenings, 36 people who are not distracted by trade or commerce from the remembrance of God and the observance of prayer and the payment of the zakat -- fearing a Day when hearts and eyes will be convulsed, 37 that God may recompense them for their fairest works and give them increase of His bounty; and God provides whomsoever He will, without reckoning. 38 But those who disbelieved - their deeds are like a mirage in a lowland which a thirsty one thinks is water until, when he comes to it, he finds it is nothing but finds Allah before Him, and He will pay him in full his due; and Allah is swift in account. 39 Or [else, their deeds are] like the depths of darkness upon an abysmal sea, made yet more dark by wave billowing over wave, with [black] clouds above it all: depths of darkness, layer upon layer, [so that] when one holds up his hand, he can hardly see it: for he to whom God gives no light, no light whatever has he! 40