could I but resort to some strong column[1]....!' (The angels said, 'O Lot! verily, we are the messengers of thy Lord, they certainly shall not reach thee; then travel with thy people in the darkness of the night, and let none of you look round except thy wife: verily, there shall befall her what befalls them. Verily, their appointment is for the morning! and is not the morning nigh?'
And when our bidding came, we made their high parts their low parts[2]. And we rained down upon them stones and baked clay[3] one after another, marked[4], from thy Lord, and these are not so far from the unjust[5]!
85And unto Midian (we sent) their brother Sho'hâib[6] He said, 'O my people! serve God; ye have no god but Him, and give not short measure and weight. Verily, I see you well off; but, verily, I fear for you the torments of an encompassing day. O my people! give measure and weight fairly, and defraud not men of their things; and wreak not wrong in the earth, corrupting it. God's residue[7]
- ↑ I.e. some support, such as a powerful clan or chieftain.
- ↑ That is, overturned the cities of the plain.
- ↑ The Abyssinians, who had invaded Mecca some years before, are mentioned in the Chapter of the Elephant (CV) as being destroyed in a similar manner by flocks of birds, who threw down such missiles upon them.
- ↑ The legend is that they each contained the name of the person for whom they were destined; so the old saying, 'every bullet has its billet.'
- ↑ I.e. the same punishment is likely to overtake other wrongdoers, the threat being especially directed against the unbelieving inhabitants of Mecca.
- ↑ See Chapter VII.
- ↑ A little which God leaves you after paying every one his due.
