۞ And assuredly Allah took a bond from the Children of Isra'il, and We raised from amongst them twelve wardens. And Allah said: verily I am with you, if ye establish prayer and give the poor-rate and believe in My apostles and support them and lend unto Allah a goodly loan, I shall surely expiate for you your misdeeds and surely shall make you enter the Gardens whereunder rivers flow; then whosoever of you shall disbelieve thereafter, he hath surely strayed from the level way. 12 And because of their breaking their covenant, We have cursed them and made hard their hearts. They change words from their context and forget a part of that whereof they were admonished. Thou wilt not cease to discover treachery from all save a few of them. But bear with them and pardon them. Lo! Allah loveth the kindly. 13 With those who said they were Nazarenes, We made a Covenant, but they have forgotten much of what they were reminded. Therefore, We stirred among them enmity and hatred till the Day of Resurrection when Allah will inform them of all that they have done. 14 O ye people of the Book! surely there hath come Our apostle unto you expounding unto you much in the Book that ye were wont to hide, and much he passeth over. Of a surety, there hath come unto you from Allah a light and a Book luminous. 15 whereby God guides whosoever follows His good pleasure in the ways of peace, and brings them forth from the shadows into the light by His leave; and He guides them to a straight path. 16 In blasphemy indeed are those who say, "God is Christ, the son of Mary." Say, "Who then could prevent God if He so willed from destroying Christ, son of Mary, and his mother and everyone on earth? The kingdom of the heavens and the earth and everything between them belong to God. He creates what He will and God has power over all things." 17 And the Jews and the Christians say: We are the sons of Allah and His beloved ones. Say: Why does He then chastise you for your faults? Nay, you are mortals from among those whom He has created, He forgives whom He pleases and chastises whom He pleases; and Allah's is the kingdom of the heavens and the earth and what is between them, and to Him is the eventual coming. 18 People of the Book, Our Messenger has come to you to make things clear to you after an interval between the messengers, lest you say, "No bearer of glad tidings and no warner has come to us." So a bearer of glad tidings and a warner has indeed come to you. God has the power to do all things. 19