The Night Journey

[LXVII.]

MECCA.¹—III Verses

In the Name of God, the Compassionate, the Merciful

GLORY be to Him who carried his servant by night² from the sacred temple of Mecca to the temple³ that is more remote, whose precinct we have blessed, that we might shew him of our signs! for He is the Hearer, the Seer.

And⁴ we gave the Book to Moses and ordained it for guidance to the children of Israel—“that ye take no other Guardian than me.”

O posterity of those whom we bare with Noah! He truly was a grateful servant!

And we solemnly declared to the children of Israel in the Book, “Twice surely will ye enact crimes in the earth, and with great loftiness of pride will ye surely be uplifted.”

So when the menace for the first crime⁵ came to be inflicted, we sent against you our servants endued with terrible prowess; and they searched the inmost part of your abodes, and the menace was accomplished.

Then we gave you the mastery over them⁶ in turn, and increased you in wealth and children, and made you a most numerous host.

We said, “If ye do well, to your own behoof will ye do well: and if ye do evil, against yourselves will ye do it. And when the menace for your latter crime⁷ came to be inflicted, then we sent an enemy to sadden your faces, and to enter the temple as they entered it at first, and to destroy with utter destruction that which they had conquered.

Haply your Lord will have mercy on you! but if ye return, we will return:⁸ and we have appointed Hell—the prison of the infidels.

Verily, this Koran guideth to what is most upright; and it announceth to believers

Who do the things that are right, that for them is a great reward;

And that for those who believe not in the life to come, we have got ready a painful punishment.

Man prayeth for evil as he prayeth for good; for man is hasty.

We have made the night and the day for two signs: the sign of the night do we obscure, but the sign of the day cause we to shine forth, that ye may seek plenty from your Lord, and that ye may know the number of the years and the reckoning of time; and we have made everything distinct by distinctiveness.

And every man’s fate⁹ have we fastened about his neck: and on the day of resurrection will we bring forth to him a book which shall be proffered to him wide open:

—“Read thy Book:¹⁰ there needeth none but thyself to make out an account against thee this day.”

For his own good only shall the guided yield to guidance, and to his own loss only shall the erring err; and the heavy laden shall not be laden with another’s load. We never punished until we had first sent an apostle:

And when we willed to destroy a city, to its affluent ones did we address our bidding; but when they acted criminally therein, just was its doom, and we destroyed it with an utter destruction.