So was it: and we gave them as a heritage to another people.

Nor Heaven nor Earth wept for them, nor was their sentence respited;

And we rescued the children of Israel from a degrading affliction—

From Pharaoh, for he was haughty, given to excess.

And we chose them, in our prescience, above all peoples,⁵

And we shewed them miracles wherein was their clear trial.

Yet these infidels say,

“There is but our first death, neither shall we be raised again:

Bring back our sires, if ye be men of truth.”

Are they better than the people of Tobba,⁶

And those who flourished before them whom we destroyed for their evil deeds?

We have not created the Heavens and the Earth and whatever is between them in sport:

We have not created them but for a serious end:⁷ but the greater part of them understand it not.

Verily the day of severing⁸ shall be the appointed time of all:

A day when the master shall not at all be aided by the servant, neither shall they be helped;

Save those on whom God shall have mercy: for He is the mighty, the merciful.

Verily the tree of Ez-Zakkoum⁹

Shall be the sinner’s¹⁰ food:

Like dregs of oil shall it boil up in their bellies,

Like the boiling of scalding water.

“—Seize ye him, and drag him into the mid-fire;

Then pour on his head of the tormenting boiling water.

—‘Taste this:’ for thou forsooth art the mighty, the honourable!

Lo! this is that of which ye doubted.”

But the pious shall be in a secure place,

Amid gardens and fountains,

Clothed in silk and richest robes, facing one another:

Thus shall it be: and we will wed them to the virgins with large dark eyes:

Therein shall they call, secure, for every kind of fruit;