The Pen (Al-Qalam)
In the name of God, the Most Gracious, the Most Merciful
۞ Nun. CONSIDER the pen, and all that they write [therewith]! 1 You are not, [O Muhammad], by the favor of your Lord, a madman. 2 There is surely reward unending for you, 3 surely thou art upon a mighty morality. 4 So you will see and they will see 5 which of you was bereft of reason. 6 Your Lord knows best who has gone astray from His path and who is rightly guided. 7 Do not, then, yield to those who reject the Truth, decrying it as false; 8 They only want that you should relent, so that they may come to terms. 9 Furthermore, defer not to the contemptible swearer of oaths, 10 [And] scorner, going about with malicious gossip - 11 A preventer of good, transgressing and sinful, 12 [or] one who is cruel, by greed possessed, and in addition to all this, utterly useless [to his fellow-men]. 13 or that because he may possess wealth and children. 14 and whenever Our verses are rehearsed to him, he says: “These are fairy- tales of times gone by.” 15 We shall brand him upon the muzzle! 16 We have put them [i.e., the Makkans] to test even as We put to test the owners of the orchard when they vowed that they would gather the fruit of their orchard in the morning, 17 and they added not the saving words. 18 Then there passed by on the (garden) something (fire) from your Lord at night and burnt it while they were asleep. 19 So by the morning it seemed as though picked clean. 20 And they called out to each other in the morning, 21 “Hurry to your orchard if you would gather its fruit.” 22 They all left, whispering to one another, 23 No Miskin (poor man) shall enter upon you into it today. 24 And they went forth early, determined upon their purpose. 25 When they saw (and did not recognise it) they said: "Surely we have lost the way. 26 (No, we are not lost.) In fact, we have been deprived of everything". 27 The best among them said: Said I not unto you: Why glorify ye not (Allah)? 28 'Exaltations to Allah, our Lord' they said, 'We were truly harmdoers' 29 Then they turned to each other reproaching. 30 They said: "Alas for us! We have indeed transgressed! 31 Maybe, our Lord will give us instead one better than it; surely to our Lord do we make our humble petition. 32 Such was their punishment, [in this life]. But the punishment of the life to come is much more severe, if only they knew it! 33