Ali Ünal - Sura: 39. Az-Zumar - The Companies

  1. (This is) the Book being sent down in parts from God, the All-Glorious with irresistible might, the All-Wise.

  2. We have sent down to you the Book with the truth (embodying it, and with nothing false in it), so worship God, sincere in your faith in Him and practicing the Religion purely for His sake.

  3. Beware! it is to God alone that all sincere faith, worship, and obedience are due. Yet, those who take, apart from Him, others (angels, jinn, or humans) for guardians and confidants (to entrust their affairs to) say: "We worship them for no other reason than they may bring us nearer to God." God will judge between them (between those who worship and obey God exclusively and those who associate partners with Him) concerning all on which they differ. God does not guide anyone who is a determined liar and ingrate.

  4. Had God willed to take to Himself a child, He could certainly have chosen whatever He willed out of all that He has created. All-Glorified is He (in that He is exalted above having any children). He is God, the One, the All-Overwhelming (with absolute sway over all that exists).

  5. He has created the heavens and the earth with truth (meaningfully and for definite purpose, and on solid foundations of truth). He wraps the night around the day and He wraps the day around the night (until one covers the other completely). And He has made the sun and the moon subservient (to His command), each running its course for a term appointed (by Him). Be aware! He is the All-Glorious with irresistible might (able to punish those who oppose Him), the All-Forgiving (Who forgives those who turn to Him in repentance).

  6. He has created you from a single human self, and then He has made from it its mate, and He has sent down for you eight in pairs of cattle. He creates you in the wombs of your mothers, one act and phase of creation after another, in three veils of darkness. This is God, your true Lord (Who creates, and sustains you): To Him belongs the sovereignty (absolute ownership and dominion of everything). There is no deity but He. How, then, are you turned about (to different kinds of belief)?

  7. If you disbelieve in Him (in ingratitude), yet surely God is absolutely independent of you. He is not pleased with ingratitude and unbelief from His servants; whereas, if you give thanks (and believe), He is pleased with it from you. And no soul, as bearer of burden, bears (and is made to bear) the burden of another. Then, to your Lord is your return so that He will make you understand all that you were doing (and call you to account). Surely He has full knowledge of what lies hidden in the bosoms.

  8. When an affliction befalls human, he calls upon his Lord turning to Him (in contrition); then when He bestows a favor upon him, he forgets what he prayed to Him for before, and sets up rivals to God so that he (himself goes astray and) misleads (others) from His way. Say (to such a one): "Enjoy life in your unbelief for a while! You are for sure one of the companions of the Fire."

  9. Is he who worships God devoutly in the watches of the night prostrating and standing, who fears the Hereafter and hopes for the mercy of his Lord (to be likened to that other)? Say: "Are they ever equal, those who know and those who do not know?" Only the people of discernment will reflect on (the distinction between knowledge and ignorance, and obedience to God and disobedience,) and be mindful.

  10. Say (quoting Me): "O My servants who believe: Keep from disobedience to your Lord in reverence for Him and piety. For those devoted to doing good in this world, aware that God is seeing them, there is good (by way of recompense). And God’s earth is vast (enabling worship). Those who are patient (persevering in adversity, worshipping God, and refraining from sins) will surely be given their reward without measure."

  11. Say: "I am commanded to worship God, sincere in faith in Him and practicing the Religion purely for His sake.

  12. "And I am commanded to be the first and foremost in being Muslim (in faith in and submission to what I am commanded to convey to you)."

  13. Say: "I fear, if I disobey my Lord, the punishment of an awesome Day."

  14. Say: "I worship God, sincere in my faith in Him and practicing the Religion purely for His sake.

  15. "(As for those of you who reject my call,) worship then whatever you will apart from Him (you are forewarned of the consequences)!" Say: "Surely the losers are those who will ruin themselves and their families on the Day of Resurrection." Beware! this indeed is the obvious loss.

  16. For them will be dark layers of the Fire above them, and dark layers below them. With this does God warn off His servants. O My servants, keep from disobedience to Me in reverence for Me and piety and so deserve My protection.

  17. As for those who keep away from false deities and powers of evil (who institute patterns of faith and rule in defiance of God) – away from worshipping them, and turn toward God in penitence, for them are glad tidings, so give the glad tidings to My servants,

  18. Who, when they hear speech, follow the best of it (in the best way possible, and even seek what is better and straighter). Those are the ones whom God has guided, and those are the ones who are people of discernment.

  19. Is he, against whom the word of (God’s) punishment has been justified and realized (to be likened to one who will be rewarded with Paradise)? Could you, then, deliver one who is in the Fire?

  20. But those who keep from disobedience to God in reverence for Him and piety, for them are lofty mansions built one above another, beneath which rivers flow. (This is) God’s promise. God never fails to fulfill His promise.

  21. Have you not considered that God sends down water from the sky, and leads it into springs in the earth to flow therein; then He causes to grow with it produce of various colors; then it withers so that you see it grow yellow; then He makes it break and fade away. In this, for sure, is a reminder for people of discernment.

  22. Is he (who derives lessons from God’s acts in the universe and so) whose breast God has expanded to Islam, so that he follows a light from his Lord (– is such a one to be likened to one whose heart is closed up to any remembrance of God and therefore to Islam)? So woe to those whose hearts are hardened against the remembrance of God (and who learn nothing from His signs and Revelations)! Those are lost in obvious error.

  23. God sends down in parts the best of the words as a Book fully consistent in itself, and whose statements corroborate, expound and refer to one another. The skins of those who stand in awe of their Lord tingle at (the hearing and understanding of) it. Then, their skins and their hearts come to rest in the Remembrance of God (the Qur’an). This is God’s guidance, by which He guides whomever He wills. And whoever God leads astray, there is no guide for him.

  24. Is he who (thrown into the Fire upon his face with his hands chained around his neck,) tries to guard himself with his face (by trying to keep it away) from the evil punishment on the Day of Resurrection (to be likened to one who will be safe from the punishment that Day)? It will be said to the wrongdoers: "Taste (this Day) what you used to earn (in the world)!"

  25. Those before them denied (the Revelation), and so the punishment came upon them without their having perceived from where it came.

  26. Thus God made them taste disgrace in the life of this world, but the punishment of the Hereafter is greater. If only they had known!

  27. Assuredly We have struck for humankind in this Qur’an all kinds of parables and comparisons, so that they may reflect and be mindful.

  28. It is a Qur’an in Arabic with no crookedness (free from any contradiction and anything offensive to truth and righteousness and reason), so that they may keep from disobedience to God in reverence for Him and piety to deserve His protection.

  29. God strikes a parable: a man in (the employment of) many partners who continuously dispute with one another, and another man employed by one person: are those two equal in likeness? All praise and gratitude are for God (the only Sovereign Lord of the creation). But most people have no knowledge (of the meaning of this truth).

  30. You will surely die (one day), and surely they (too) will die.

  31. Then, on the Day of Resurrection, you will stand in the Presence of your Lord as litigants.

  32. Who, then, is more in the wrong than he who fabricates falsehood against God, and denies the truth when it comes to him? Is there not in Hell a dwelling for the unbelievers?!

  33. As for him who has come with the truth and him who has confirmed it, those are the God-revering, pious ones.

  34. For them is whatever they desire in the Presence of their Lord. That is the reward of those devoted to doing good, aware that God is seeing them.

  35. For God will blot out from them (even) the worst of what they once did, and pay them their reward in accordance with the best of what they used to do.

  36. Is not God sufficient for His servant? Yet they seek to frighten you with those (whom they deify and worship) apart from God. Whoever God leads astray, there is no guide for him.

  37. And whomever God guides, there is no one who can lead him astray. Is not God All-Glorious with irresistible might, Able to Requite?

  38. Indeed, if you ask them who has created the heavens and the earth, they will certainly say, "God." Say: "Have you, then, ever considered what it is that you invoke apart from God? If God wills some harm for me, are they the ones that can remove His harm (from me), or if He wills for me a mercy, are they the ones that can withhold it?" Say: "God is sufficient for me. In Him do those who trust (and know the worth and meaning of putting one’s trust) put their trust.

  39. Say: "O my people! Do all that may be within your power, surely I (too) am doing (the work asked of me). In time you will come to know

  40. Who they are upon whom (in the world) there will come a punishment that will abase them, and upon whom a lasting punishment will descend (in the Hereafter)."

  41. Surely We have sent down the Book to you with the truth for humankind (embodying the truth, and with no falsehood in it). So, whoever chooses to go right, it is for his own soul’s good; and whoever chooses to go astray, goes astray but to its own harm. You are not one appointed as a guardian over them (to assume their responsibility for going right).

  42. God takes the spirits at the time of the death of (the souls), and in their sleep those (of the ones) that have not died. He withholds (the spirits of) those for whom He has decreed death, and the rest He sends back (to their bodies to live on) for a term appointed by Him. Surely in that are signs (important lessons) for people who reflect and are mindful.

  43. What! (Failing to recognize that God is the sole Authority over the universe in need of nothing) have they taken to themselves, apart from God, intercessors (whom they suppose capable of intervening for their souls or even in the operation of the universe)? Say: "Why – even though they have no share in the dominion of anything, nor (like idols) any sense or intelligence?

  44. Say: "To God exclusively belongs the whole authority to intercede, (whether He grants any being permission to intercede with Him or not). To Him alone belongs the sovereignty of the heavens and the earth. Then, to Him you will be returned."

  45. When God as One (and only God) is mentioned, the hearts of those who do not believe in the Hereafter recoil in aversion; but when those (whom they worship) apart from Him are mentioned, they are surely gladdened.

  46. Say: "O God, Originator of the heavens and the earth, the Knower of the Unseen and the witnessed! You it is Who will judge among Your servants concerning that on which they differ."

  47. Even if those who do the greatest wrong (by associating partners with God and refusing to believe in the Hereafter) could possess all that is on the earth and its like besides, they would certainly offer it as ransom to escape from the evil punishment on the Day of Resurrection. Something will confront them from God, which they never reckoned.

  48. The evil deeds they earned (to their account) will become obvious to them, and what they used to mock (God’s promised punishment) will overwhelm them.

  49. When an affliction befalls human he calls upon Us (to save him). Then, when We (from sheer grace) have bestowed a favor upon him from Us, he says: "I have been given this only by virtue of a certain knowledge that I have." No, indeed. Rather, this (favor bestowed on human) is a trial, but most of them do not know.

  50. Those who lived before them (and adopted the same attitude and followed a similar way) said it (too); but all that they achieved (in the world) was of no avail to them.

  51. The evil results of what they earned fell upon them. So also will the evil results of what they have earned fall upon these (new generations) who do wrong. And they will never be able to frustrate (Our will).

  52. Do they still not know that God enlarges provision for whom He wills, and restricts it (for whom He wills). Surely in that are signs (of the clear truth) for people who will believe and who will deepen in faith.

  53. Say: "(God gives you hope): ‘O My servants who have been wasteful (of their God-given opportunities and faculties) against (the good of) their own souls! Do not despair of God’s Mercy. Surely God forgives all sins. He is indeed the All-Forgiving, the All-Compassionate.’ "

  54. Turn to your Lord in penitence and submit to Him wholly before the punishment comes upon you (when it will be too late, and acknowledgment of faith will no longer avail you); for after (that) you will not be helped.

  55. Follow in the best way possible what has been sent down to you from your Lord, before the punishment comes upon you all of a sudden, without your being aware (of its coming);

  56. Lest any soul should say, "Alas for me for that I have fallen short of my duty to God, and I was indeed among those who used to mock (at the truth)!"

  57. Or (lest it) should say (by way of invalid excuse): "If only God had guided me, I would surely have been among the God-revering, pious!"

  58. Or (lest it) should say when it sees the punishment, "If only I had a second chance (to live), so that I could be among those devoted to doing good, aware that God is seeing them!"

  59. (But God will answer): "No, indeed! My Revelations and signs (of the truth) did come to you, but you denied them, and grew in arrogance (so as not to confirm them), and you proved yourself to be one of the unbelievers."

  60. On the Day of Resurrection you will see those who fabricated falsehood in attribution to God with their faces darkened by grief and ignominy. Is there not in Hell a dwelling for those (too) arrogant (for faith)!

  61. But God will save (from Hell) those who keep from disobedience to God in reverence for Him and piety by virtue of what they have achieved (in following God’s way). Evil will never touch them, nor will they grieve.

  62. God is the Creator of all things, and He is the Guardian (with power of disposition) over all things.

  63. His are the keys of (the treasures of) the heavens and the earth. So those who disbelieve in God’s Revelations and signs (of the truth) – such are they who are the losers.

  64. Say: "(That being the truth) do you still call me to worship other than God, O ignorant ones?"

  65. Indeed it has been revealed to you as well as to those (Messengers) sent before you: "Should you associate partners with God, your labor will most certainly come to nothing and you will most certainly be among the losers.

  66. Rather: worship God alone, and be among the thankful."

  67. They have no true judgment of God as His right, such as His being God requires, and (such is His Power and Sovereignty that) the whole earth will be in His Grasp on the Day of Resurrection, and the heavens will be rolled up in His Right Hand. All-Glorified is He, and absolutely exalted above what they associate with Him.

  68. The Trumpet will be blown, and so all who are in the heavens and all who are on the earth will fall dead, except those whom God wills to exempt. Then it will be blown for the second time, and see, they have all stood upright, looking on (in anticipation).

  69. And the earth (altered from what it was) will be bright and clearly visible throughout by the Light of its Lord, and the Record (of the deeds of responsible beings endowed with free will) will be laid out, and the Prophets and the Witnesses will be brought forward, and it will be judged among them (conscious, responsible beings) with truth (concerning that on which they used to differ), and they will not be wronged.

  70. And every soul will be paid in full whatever (good or evil) it has done (in the world); and indeed He knows best all that they do.

  71. Those who disbelieve (and die unbelievers) will be led to Hell in companies. Until when they arrive there, its doors will immediately be opened and its keepers will ask them: "Did there not come to you Messengers from among you, reciting to you the Revelations of your Lord and warning you of this Day that you were to encounter?" They will answer: "Yes, indeed!" But the word of (God’s) punishment upon the unbelievers is fulfilled.

  72. They will be told: "Enter through the doors of Hell, to abide therein." How evil is the dwelling of those (too) arrogant (to believe).

  73. Those who keep from disobedience to their Lord in reverence for Him and piety will be led to Paradise in companies. Until when they arrive there, its doors will be opened (as sheer grace from God), and its keepers will welcome them saying: "Peace be upon you! Well you have faired and are purified (from the foul residues of sin, and delivered from all suffering), so enter it (Paradise) to abide!"

  74. And they say: "All praise and gratitude are for God, Who has fulfilled His promise to us, and has made us inheritors of this land (of bliss), so that We may dwell in Paradise as we please!" Then: how excellent is the reward of the doers (of good deeds in obedience and devotion to God)!

  75. And you (O Messenger) will see the angels surrounding the Supreme Throne (of God), glorifying their Lord with His praise. It has been judged among them with truth and justice, and it will be said (by all the people of Paradise): "All praise and gratitude are for God, the Lord of the worlds!"

 

Sura 38Sura 40