Exalted then be God, the King, the Truth! Be not hasty in its recital²⁶ while the revelation of it to thee is incomplete. Say rather, “O my Lord, increase knowledge unto me.”

And of old We made a covenant with Adam; but he forgat it; and we found no firmness of purpose in him.

And when We said to the angels, “Fall down and worship Adam,” they worshipped all, save Eblis, who refused: and We said, “O Adam! this truly is a foe to thee and to thy wife. Let him not therefore drive you out of the garden, and ye become wretched;

For to thee is it granted that thou shalt not hunger therein, neither shalt thou be naked;

But Satan whispered him: said he, “O Adam! shall I shew thee the tree of Eternity,²⁷ and the Kingdom that faileth not?”

And they both ate thereof, and their nakedness appeared to them, and they began to sew of the leaves of the Garden to cover them, and Adam disobeyed his Lord and went astray.

Afterwards his Lord chose him for himself, and was turned towards him, and guided him.

And God said, “Get ye all down hence, the one of you a foe unto the other. Hereafter shall guidance come unto you from me;

And whoso followeth my guidance shall not err, and shall not be wretched:

But whoso turneth away from my monition, his truly shall be a life of misery:

And We will assemble him with others on the day of Resurrection, blind.”²⁸

He will say, “O my Lord! why hast thou assembled me with others, blind? whereas I was endowed with sight.”

He will answer, “Thus is it, because our signs came unto thee and thou didst forget them, and thus shalt thou be forgotten this day.”

Even thus will We recompense him who hath transgressed and hath not believed in the signs of his Lord; and assuredly the chastisement of the next world will be more severe and more lasting.

Are not they, who walk the very places where they dwelt, aware how many generations we have destroyed before them? Verily in this are signs to men of insight.

And had not a decree of respite from thy Lord first gone forth, their chastisement had at once ensued. Yet the time is fixed.

Put up then with what they say; and celebrate the praise of thy Lord before the sunrise, and before its setting; and some time in the night do thou praise him, and in the extremes²⁹ of the day, that thou haply mayest please Him.

And strain not thine eye after what We have bestowed on divers of them—the braveries of this world—that we may thereby prove them. The portion which thy Lord will give, is better and more lasting.

Enjoin prayer on thy family, and persevere therein. We ask not of thee to find thine own provision—we will provide for thee, and a happy issue shall there be to piety.

But they say, “If he come not to us with a sign from his Lord …!”³⁰ But have not clear proofs for the Koran come to them, in what is in the Books of old?