THE QUR’AN
9. REPENTANCE
they are people with no knowledge [of it]. 7How could there be a treaty with God and His Messenger for such idolaters? But as for those with whom you made a treaty at the Sacred Mosque, so long as they remain true to you, be true to them; God loves those who are mindful of Him. 8[How,] when, if they were to get the upper hand over you, they would not respect any tie with you, of kinship or of treaty? They please you with their tongues, but their hearts are against you and most of them are lawbreakers. 9They have sold
God’s message for a tri ing gain, and barred others from His path.
How evil their actions are! 10Where believers are concerned, they respect no tie of kinship or treaty. They are the ones who are committing aggression. 11If they turn to God, keep up the prayer, and pay the prescribed alms, then they are your brothers in faith:
We make the messages clear for people who are willing to learn.
12But if they break their oath after having made an agreement with you, if they revile your religion, then ght the leaders of disbelief—
oaths mean nothing to them—so that they may stop. 13How could you not ght a people who have broken their oaths, who tried to drive the Messenger out, who attacked you rst? Do you fear them?
It is God you should fear if you are true believers. 14Fight them: God will punish them at your hands, He will disgrace them, He will help you to conquer them, He will heal the believers’ feelings 15and
remove the rage from their hearts. God turns to whoever He will in His mercy; God is all knowing and wise. 16Do you think that you will be left untesteda without God identifying which of you will strive for His cause and take no supporters apart from God, His Messenger, and other believers? God is fully aware of all your actions.
17It is not right for the idolaters to tend God’s places of worship while testifying to their own disbelief: the deeds of such people will come to nothing and they will abide in Hell. 18The only ones who should tend God’s places of worship are those who believe in God and the Last Day, who keep up the prayer, who pay the prescribed alms, and who fear no one but God: such people may hope to be
among the rightly guided. 19Do you consider giving water to
pilgrims and tending the Sacred Mosque to be equal to the deeds of those who believe in God and the Last Day and who strive in God’s path? They are not equal in God’s eyes. God does not guide such benighted people. 20Those who believe, who migrated and strove hard in God’s way with their possessions and their persons, are in God’s eyes much higher in rank; it is they who will triumph; 21and their Lord gives them the good news of His mercy and pleasure, Gardens where they will have lasting bliss 22and where they will remain for ever: truly, there is a tremendous reward with God.
23Believers, do not take your fathers and brothers as alliesa if they prefer disbelief to faith: those of you who do so are doing wrong.
24Say [Prophet], ‘If your fathers, sons, brothers, wives, tribes, the wealth you have acquired, the trade which you fear will decline, and the dwellings you love are dearer to you than God and His Messenger and the struggle in His cause, then wait until God brings about His punishment.’ God does not guide those who break away.
25God has helped you [believers] on many battle elds, even on the day of the Battle of Hunayn.b You were well pleased with your large numbers, but they were of no use to you: the earth seemed to close in on you despite its spaciousness, and you turned tail and ed.
26Then God sent His calm down to His Messenger and the believers, and He sent down invisible forces. He punished the disbelievers—
this is what the disbelievers deserve— 27but God turns in His mercy to whoever He will. God is most forgiving and merciful.
28Believers, those who ascribe partners to God are truly unclean:
do not let them come near the Sacred Mosque after this year. If you are afraid you may become poor, [bear in mind that] God will
enrich you out of His bounty if He pleases: God is all knowing and wise. 29Fight those of the People of the Book who do not [truly]c believe in God and the Last Day, who do not forbid what God and His Messenger have forbidden, who do not obey the rule of justice,d until they pay the taxe and agree to submit.f 30The Jews said, ‘Ezra is the son of God,’a and the Christians said, ‘The Messiah is the son
of God’: they said this with their own mouths, repeating what earlier disbelievers had said. May God confound them! How far astray they have been led! 31They take their rabbis and their monks as lords, as well as Christ, the son of Mary. But they were
commanded to serve only one God: there is no god but Him; He is far above whatever they set up as His partners! 32They try to
extinguish God’s light with their mouths, but God insists on bringing His light to its fullness, even if the disbelievers hate it. 33It is He who has sent His Messenger with guidance and the religion of truth, to show that it is above all [other] religions, however much the idolaters may hate this. 34Believers, many rabbis and monks
wrongfully consume people’s possessions and turn people away from God’s path. [Prophet], tell those who hoard gold and silver instead of giving in God’s cause that they will have a grievous punishment:
35on the Day it is heated up in Hell’s Fire and used to brand their foreheads, sides, and backs, they will be told, ‘This is what you hoarded up for yourselves! Now feel the pain of what you hoarded!’
36God decrees that there are twelve months—ordained in God’s Book on the Day when He created the heavens and earth—four months of which are sacred:b this is the correct calculation.c Do not wrong your souls in these months—though you may ght the
idolaters at any time,d if they rst ght you—remember that God is with those who are mindful of Him. 37Postponing sacred months is another act of disobedience by which those who disregard [God] are led astray: they will allow it one year and forbid it in another in order outwardly to conform with the number of God’s sacred
months, but in doing so they permit what God has forbidden. Their evil deeds are made alluring to them: God does not guide those who disregard [Him].
38Believers, why, when it is said to you, ‘Go and ght in God’s way,’ do you feel weighed down to the ground? Do you prefer this world to the life to come? How small the enjoyment of this world is, compared with the life to come! 39If you do not go out and ght, God will punish you severely and put others in your place, but you
cannot harm Him in any way: God has power over all things. 40Even if you do not help the Prophet, God helped him when the
disbelievers drove him out: when the two of thema were in the cave, he [Muhammad] said to his companion, ‘Do not worry, God is with us,’ and God sent His calm down to him, aided him with forces
invisible to you, and brought down the disbelievers’ plan. God’s plan is higher: God is almighty and wise. 41So go out, no matter whether you are lightly or heavily armed, and struggle in God’s way with your possessions and your persons: this is better for you, if you only knew. 42They would certainly have followed you [Prophet] if the bene t was within sight and the journey short, but the distance seemed too great for them. They will swear by God, ‘If we could, we certainly would go out [to battle] with you,’ but they ruin
themselves, for God knows that they are lying.
43God forgive you [Prophet]! Why did you give them permission to stay at home before it had become clear to you which of them spoke the truth and which were liars? 44Those who have faith in God and the Last Day do not ask you for exemption from struggle with their possessions and their persons—God knows exactly who is mindful of Him— 45only those who do not have faith in God and the Last Day ask your permission to stay at home: they have doubt in their hearts and so they waver. 46If they had really wanted to go out [to battle] with you, they would have made preparations, but God was loath to let them rise up and made them hold back. It was said,
‘Stay with those who stay behind.’ 47They would only have given you trouble if they had gone out [to battle] with you: they would have scurried around, trying to sow discord among you, and some of you would willingly have listened to them—God knows exactly who does evil. 48Indeed, they had tried before that to stir up discord:
they devised plots against you [Prophet] until the truth was exposed and God’s will triumphed, much to their disgust. 49Some of them said, ‘Give me permission to stay at home: do not trouble me.’ They are already in trouble: Hell will engulf the disbelievers. 50If you [Prophet] have good fortune, it will grieve them, but if misfortune
comes your way, they will say to themselves, ‘We took precautions for this,’ and go away rejoicing. 51Say, ‘Only what God has decreed will happen to us. He is our Master: let the believers put their trust in God.’ 52Say, ‘Do you expect something other than one of the two best things to happen to us?a Well, we expect God to in ict
punishment on you, either from Himself or at our hands. So wait;
we too are waiting.’ 53Say, ‘Whether you give willingly or unwillingly, what you give will not be accepted, for you are
disobedient people.’ 54The only thing that prevents what they give from being accepted is the fact that they defy God and His
Messenger, perform the prayer only lazily, and give only grudgingly.
55So [Prophet] do not let their possessions or their children impress you: through these God intends to punish them in this world and for their souls to depart while they disbelieve.
56They swear by God that they belong with you [believers], but they do not. They are cowardly: 57if they could nd a place of
refuge, or a cave, or somewhere to crawl into, they would run there with great haste. 58Some of them nd fault with you [Prophet]
regarding the distribution of alms: they are content if they are given a share, but angry if not. 59If only they would be content with what God and His Messenger have given them, and say, ‘God is enough for us—He will give us some of His bounty and so will His
Messenger—to God alone we turn in hope.’ 60Alms are meant only for the poor, the needy, those who administer them, those whose hearts need winning over, to free slaves and help those in debt, for God’s cause, and for travellers in need. This is ordained by God; God is all knowing and wise.
61There are others who insult the Prophet by saying, ‘He will
listen to anything.’ Say, ‘He listens for your own good: he believes in God, trusts the believers, and is a mercy for those of you who
believe.’ An agonizing torment awaits those who insult God’s
Messenger. 62They swear by God in order to please you [believers]:
if they were true believers it would be more tting for them to please God and His Messenger. 63Do they not know that whoever
opposes God and His Messenger will go to the Fire of Hell and stay there? That is the supreme disgrace.
64The hypocrites fear that a sura will be revealed exposing what is in their hearts—say, ‘Carry on with your jokes: God will bring about what you fear!’— 65yet if you were to question them, they would be sure to say, ‘We were just chatting, just amusing
ourselves.’ Say, ‘Were you making jokes about God, His Revelations, and His Messenger? 66Do not try to justify yourselves; you have gone from belief to disbelief We may forgive some of you, but We will punish others: they are evildoers. 67The hypocrites, both men and women, are all the same: they order what is wrong and forbid what is right; they are tight- sted. They have ignored God, so He has ignored them.a The hypocrites are the disobedient ones. 68God promises the Fire of Hell as a permanent home for the hypocrites, both men and women, and the disbelievers: this is enough for them.
God rejects them and a lasting punishment awaits them. 69‘Youb are like those who lived before you: they were even stronger than you, with more wealth and children; they enjoyed their share in this life as you have enjoyed yours; like them, you have indulged in idle talk.’ Their deeds go to waste in this world and the next; it is they who will lose all in the life to come. 70Have they never heard the stories about their predecessors, the peoples of Noah, ‘Ad, Thamud, Abraham, Midian, and the ruined cities? Their messengers came to them with clear evidence of the truth: God would not deceive them;
they deceived themselves.
71The believers, both men and women, support each other; they order what is right and forbid what is wrong; they keep up the prayer and pay the prescribed alms; they obey God and His
Messenger. God will give His mercy to such people: God is almighty and wise. 72God has promised the believers, both men and women, Gardens graced with owing streams where they will remain; good, peaceful homes in Gardens of lasting bliss; and—greatest of all—
God’s good pleasure. That is the supreme triumph.
73Prophet, strive against the disbelievers and the hypocrites, and be tough with them. Hell is their nal home—an evil destination!
74They swear by God that they did not, but they certainly did speak words of de ance and became de ant after having submitted; they tried to do something,c though they did not achieve it, —being
spiteful was their only response to God and His Messenger enriching them out of His bounty. They would be better o turning back [to God]: if they turn away, God will punish them in this world and the Hereafter, and there will be no one on earth to protect or help them.
75There are some among them who pledged themselves to God, saying, ‘If God gives us some of His bounty, we shall certainly give alms and be righteous,’ 76yet when He did give them some of His bounty, they became mean and turned obstinately away. 77Because they broke their promise to God, because of all the lies they told, He made hypocrisy settle in their hearts until the Day they meet Him.
78Do they not realize that God knows their secrets and their private discussions? That God knows all that is hidden? 79It is they who criticize the believers who give freely and those who can only give a little with great e ort: they sco at such people, but it is God who sco s at them—a painful punishment awaits them. 80It makes no di erence [Prophet] whether you ask forgiveness for them or not:
God will not forgive them even if you ask seventy times, because they reject God and His Messenger. God does not guide those who rebel against Him.
81Those who were left behind were happy to stay behind when God’s Messenger set out; they hated the thought of striving in God’s way with their possessions and their persons. They said to one
another, ‘Do not go [to war] in this heat.’ Say, ‘Hell re is hotter.’ If only they understood! 82Let them laugh a little; they will weep a lot in return for what they have done. 83So [Prophet], if God brings you back to a group of them, who ask you for permission to go out [to battle], say, ‘You will never go out and ght an enemy with me: you chose to sit at home the rst time, so remain with those who stay behind now.’
84Do not hold prayers for any of them if they die, and do not stand by their graves: they disbelieved in God and His Messenger and died rebellious. 85Do not let their possessions and their children impress you: God means to punish them through these in this world, and that their souls should depart while they disbelieve. 86When a sura is revealed [saying], ‘Believe in God and strive hard alongside His Messenger,’ their wealthy ask your permission [to be exempt], saying, ‘Allow us to stay behind with the others’: 87they prefer to be with those who stay behind. Their hearts have been sealed: they do not comprehend. 88But the Messenger and those who believe with him strive hard with their possessions and their persons. The best things belong to them; it is they who will prosper. 89God has
prepared Gardens graced with owing streams for them and there they will stay. That is the supreme triumph.
90Some of the desert Arabs, too, came to make excuses, asking to be granted exemption. Those who lied to God and His Messenger stayed behind at home. A painful punishment will a ict those of them who disbelieved, 91but there is no blame attached to the weak, the sick, and those who have no means to spend, provided they are true to God and His Messenger—there is no reason to reproach
those who do good: God is most forgiving and merciful. 92And there is no blame attached to those who came to you [Prophet] for riding animals and to whom you said, ‘I cannot nd a mount for you’: they turned away with their eyes over owing with tears of grief that they had nothing they could contribute. 93The ones open to blame are those who asked you for exemption despite their wealth, and who preferred to be with those who stay behind. God has sealed their hearts: they do not understand.
94When you return from the expedition they will carry on coming to you [believers] with excuses. Say, ‘Do not make excuses. We do not believe you: God has told us about you. God and His Messenger will watch your actions now, and in the end you will be returned to the One who knows the seen and the unseen. He will confront you with what you have done.’ 95When you return to them, they will