safety, they were invited to bow in worship, but would not obey.

Leave me alone therefore with him who chargeth this revelation with
imposture. We will lead them by degrees to their ruin; by ways which they
know not;

Yet will I bear long with them; for my plan is sure.

Askest thou any recompense from them? But they are burdened with debt.

Are the secret things within their ken? Do they copy them from the Book of
God?

Patiently then await the judgment of thy Lord, and be not like him who was in
the fish,7 when in deep distress he cried to God.

Had not favour from his Lord reached him, cast forth would he have been on
the naked shore, overwhelmed with shame:

But his Lord chose him and made him of the just.

Almost would the infidels strike thee down with their very looks when they
hear the warning of the Koran. And they say, "He is certainly possessed."

Yet is it nothing less than a warning for all creatures.


_______________________

1 It has been conjectured that as the word Nun means fish, there may be a
reference to the fish which swallowed Jonas (v. 48). The fact, however, is
that the meaning of this and of the similar symbols, throughout the Koran,
was unknown to the Muhammadans themselves even in the first century. Possibly
the letters Ha, Mim, which are prefixed to numerous successive Suras were
private marks, or initial letters, attached by their proprietor to the copies
furnished to Said when effecting his recension of the text under Othman. In
the same way, the letters prefixed to other Suras may be monograms, or
abbreviations, or initial letters of the names of the persons to whom the
copies of the respective Suras belonged.

addenda: The symbol nun may possibly refer to this letter as forming the
Rhyme in most of the verses of this Sura.

2 This Sura has been supposed by ancient Muslim authorities to be, if not the
oldest, the second revelation, and to have followed Sura xcvi. But this
opinion probably originated from the expression in v. 1 compared with Sura
xcvi. 4. Verses 17-33 read like a later addition, and this passage, as well
as verse 48-50, has been classed with the Medina revelations. In the absence
of any reliable criterion for fixing the date, I have placed this Sura with
those which detail the opposition encountered by the Prophet at Mecca.

3 By djinn. Comp. Sur. xxxiv. 45.

4 In bearing the taunts of the unbelievers with patience.

5 They did not add the restriction, if God will.

6 An expression implying a grievous calamity; borrowed probably from the
action of stripping previous to wrestling, swimming, etc.

7 Lit. the companion of the fish. Comp. on Jonah Sura xxxvii. 139-148, and
Sura xxi. 87.


SURA XC.-THE SOIL [XVIII.]

MECCA.-20 Verses

In the Name of God, the Compassionate, the Merciful

I NEED not to swear by this SOIL,

This soil on which thou dost dwell,

Or by sire and offspring!1

Surely in trouble have we created man.

What! thinketh he that no one hath power over him?

"I have wasted," saith he, "enormous riches!"

What! thinketh he that no one regardeth him?

What! have we not made him eyes,

And tongue, and lips,

And guided him to the two highways?2

Yet he attempted not the steep.

And who shall teach thee what the steep is?

It is to ransom the captive,3

Or to feed in the day of famine,

The orphan who is near of kin, or the poor that lieth in the dust;



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