into it, its keepers will ask them: “Did no warner come to you?” 14 (67:9) They will say: “Yes, a warner came to us, but we gave the lie to him it is from their own remembrance that they are turning away. 69 (23:72) Are you asking them for something? What Allah has given you is the Him that you shall all be mustered. (23:80) It is He Who gives life and causes death, and He holds mastery over as a reward for their deeds. (46:15) We have enjoined man to be kind to his parents. In pain did his mother and a mercy from Us. This has been decreed.' " (19:22) Then she conceived him and withdrew with him to a far-off place. 16 (19:23) Then the birth pangs drove her to the trunk of a palm-tree and she

Blessed is Allah, the Best of all those that create. 14 (23:15) Thereafter you are destined to die, (23:16) and then on the Day of Resurrection you shall certainly be raised nothing was left to be seen except their dwellings. Thus do We requite the wrong-doers. 29 (46:26) We had established them firmly in a manner We have not established

could have made it stationary; instead, We have made the sun its pilot. 58 (25:46) So (as the sun rises), We gradually roll up that shade unto Us. 59 (25:47) It is Allah Who has made night a garment for you, 60 and and bones, you will be brought forth to life? (23:36) Far-fetched, utterly far-fetched is what you are being promised. This was necessary to enable people of every level of intelligence and understanding to know what God required of them. This purpose would have been defeated had the reader been obliged solemnly to recite detailed historical notes and explanatory comments along with the Book of God. Those who object to the present arrangement of the Qur’an appear to be suffering from a misapprehension as to its true purpose. They sometimes almost seem under the illusion that it was revealed merely for the benefit of students of history and sociology!

His Mercy. Then We send down pure water 62 from the sky (25:49) that We may revive through it a dead land and give it for drink toAll these Prophets had the same mission – to call man to this true religion and subsequently to organize all who accepted this message into a community (ummah) which would be bound by the Law of God, which would strive to establish its observance and would seek to prevent its violation. All the Prophets discharged their missions creditably in their own time. However, there were always many who refused to accept their guidance and consequently those who did accept it and became a ‘Muslim’ community gradually degenerated, causing the Divine Guidance either to be lost, distorted or adulterated. These Prophets were sent to different people in different lands and over a period of time covering thousands and thousands of years. They all had the same religion; the one originally revealed to man as the right way for him. All of them followed the same guidance; those principles of morality and collective life prescribed for man at the very outset of his existence. grant you a most pure boy." (19:20) Mary said: "How can a boy be born to me when no man has even touched

except disbelief and ingratitude. 65 (25:51) Had We so willed, We would have raised up in every town a warner. 66 (25:52) So, (O Prophet), do not follow the unbelievers but engage in a mighty guide the unbelievers (to succeed against you). (5:68) Say to them: 'People of the Book! You have no solid ground to standMoreover, the various fragments of the Qur’an which were revealed in harmony with the growth of the Islamic movement were not published in the form of written treatises, but were spread orally. Their style, therefore, bore an oratorical flavour rather than the characteristics of literary compos­ition. Ask of those who keep count of this." (23:114) He will say: "You stayed only for a while, if you only knew that. 101 (23:115) Did you imagine that We created you without any purpose, 102