The Stars (Al-Najm)
In the name of Allah, Most Gracious, Most Merciful
I CALL TO witness the star of the pleiades when it has dipped 1 Your comrade erreth not, nor is deceived; 2 He does not speak out of his own desires. 3 This is only revelation communicated, 4 One of mighty powers hath taught it him. 5 and endowed with wisdom; who in time manifested himself; 6 being on the higher horizon, 7 Then he approached and descended 8 Until a space of two bow (arcs) or even less remained, 9 And He revealed to His servant what He revealed. 10 His heart added no untruth to what he saw. 11 Will ye therefore dispute with him concerning that which he hath seen? 12 For indeed he saw him at a second descent, 13 by the Lote-Tree of the Boundary 14 close to the Garden of Refuge. 15 When that which shroudeth did enshroud the lote-tree, 16 his eye swerved not; nor swept astray. 17 Assuredly he beheld of the sign of his Lord, the greatest. 18 Have you ever thought about al-Lat and al-Uzza, 19 and, another, the third manat? 20 What! for you the male sex, and for Him, the female? 21 That indeed is an unfair division -- 22 these are nothing but names which you yourselves have devised, you and your forefathers. God has sent down no authority for them. They follow nothing but conjecture and what their own selves desire, even though guidance has already come to them from their Lord! 23 Does man imagine that whatever he wishes for is right for him? 24 But it is to Allah that the End and the Beginning (of all things) belong. 25