* | quran | * | 70. al-ma`arij. the ladders      <   > 

arberry
 
1.  *     A questioner asked of a chastisement about to fall
 
2.  *     for the unbelievers, which none may avert,
 
3.  *     from God, the Lord of the Stairways.
 
4.  *     To Him the angels and the Spirit mount up, in a day whereof the measure is fifty thousand years.
 
5.  *     So be thou patient with a sweet patience;
 
6.  *     behold, they see it as if far off;
 
7.  *     but We see it is nigh.
 
8.  *     Upon the day when heaven shall be as molten copper
 
9.  *     and the mountains shall be as plucked wool-tufts,
 
10.  *     no loyal friend shall question loyal friend,
 
11.  *     as they are given sight of them. The sinner will wish that he might ransom himself from the chastisement of that day even by his sons,
 
12.  *     his companion wife, his brother,
 
13.  *     his kin who sheltered him,
 
14.  *     and whosoever is in the earth, all together, so that then it might deliver him.
 
15.  *     Nay, verily it is a furnace
 
16.  *     snatching away the scalp,
 
17.  *     calling him who drew back and turned away,
 
18.  *     who amassed and hoarded.
 
19.  *     Surely man was created fretful,
 
20.  *     when evil visits him, impatient,
 
21.  *     when good visits him, grudging,
 
22.  *     save those that pray
 
23.  *     and continue at their prayers,
 
24.  *     those in whose wealth is a right known
 
25.  *     for the beggar and the outcast,
 
26.  *     who confirm the Day of Doom
 
27.  *     and go in fear of the chastisement of their Lord
 
28.  *     (from their Lord's chastisement none feels secure)
 
29.  *     and guard their private parts
 
30.  *     save from their wives and what their right hands own, then not being blameworthy
 
31.  *     (but whoso seeks after more than that, they are the transgressors),
 
32.  *     and who preserve their trusts and their covenant,
 
33.  *     and perform their witnessings,
 
34.  *     and who observe their prayers.
 
35.  *     Those shall be in Gardens, high-honoured.
 
36.  *     What ails the unbelievers, running with outstretched necks
 
37.  *     towards thee on the right hand and on the left hand in knots?
 
38.  *     What, is every man of them eager to be admitted to a Garden of Bliss?
 
39.  *     Not so; for We have created them of what they know.
 
40.  *     No! I swear by the Lord of the Easts and Wests, surely We are able
 
41.  *     to substitute a better than they; We shall not be outstripped.
 
42.  *     Then leave them alone to plunge and play until they encounter that day of theirs which they are promised,
 
43.  *     the day they shall come forth from the tombs hastily, as if they were hurrying unto a waymark,
 
44.  *     humbled their eyes, overspreading them abasement. That is the day which they were promised.