AND CALL to mind, through this divine writ, Mary. Lo! She withdrew from her family to an eastern place 16 and drew a curtain, screening herself from people whereupon We sent to her Our spirit and he appeared to her as a well-shaped man. 17 She exclaimed: "Verily, 'I seek refuge from thee with the Most Gracious! [Approach me not] if thou art conscious of Him!" 18 He said: "I am just a message-bearer of your Lord, I have come to grant you a most pure boy." 19 She said, 'How shall I have a son whom no mortal has touched, neither have I been unchaste?' 20 He said, "This is true but your Lord says, "It is very easy for Me. We have decided to give you a son as evidence (of Our existence) for human beings and a mercy from Us. This is a decree already ordained." 21 ۞ So she conceived him, and withdrew with him to a distant place. 22 The birth pangs led her to the trunk of a date-palm tree. "Would that I had died before this," she said, "and become a thing forgotten, unremembered." 23 But he called her from below her, "Do not grieve; your Lord has provided beneath you a stream. 24 And shake towards you the trunk of the palmtree, it will drop on you fresh ripe dates: 25 Eat, then, and drink, and let thine eye be gladdened! And if thou shouldst see any human being, convey this unto him: 'Behold, abstinence from speech have I vowed unto the Most Gracious; hence, I may not speak today to any mortal. 26 Then she brought him to her own folk, carrying him. They said: O Mary! Thou hast come with an amazing thing. 27 O sister of Aaron! Your father was not an evil man, nor was your mother an unchaste woman." 28 Then she Pointed to him. They said: how shall we speak to one who is in the cradle, a child? 29 "I am a servant of God," he answered. "He has given me a Book and made me a prophet, 30 He made me to be blessed wherever I am, and He has charged me with prayer and charity for as long as I shall live. 31 He has made me dutiful toward my mother, and He has not made me arrogant or wicked. 32 And peace on me on the day I was born, and on the day I die, and on the day I am raised to life. 33 Such is 'Iesa (Jesus), son of Maryam (Mary). (it is) a statement of truth, about which they doubt (or dispute). 34 It does not befit Allah to appoint someone as His son – Purity is to Him! When He ordains a matter, He just commands it, “Be” – and it thereupon happens. 35 God is my Lord and your Lord, so worship Him alone. That is the right path. 36 Then the sects have differed among themselves; so woe to those who disbelieve in the witness of a Day Mighty! 37 How well they will hear and see on the day they come to Us! But the evildoers even today are in error manifest. 38 And warn them of the Day of anguish when the case hath been decided. Now they are in a state of carelessness, and they believe not. 39 We are the heirs of the earth and those living in it will all return to Us. 40