Quran — Page 300

THUS, INDEED, have We given in this Qur'an many facets to every kind of lesson [designed] for [the benefit of] mankind. However, man is, above all else, always given to contention:

for, what is there to keep people from attaining to faith now that guidance has come unto them, and from asking their Sustainer to forgive them their sins - unless it be [their wish] that the fate of the [sinful] people of ancient times should befall them [as well], or that the [ultimate] suffering should befall them in the hereafter?

But We send [Our] message-bearers only as heralds of glad tidings and as warners - whereas those who are bent on denying the truth contend [against them] with fallacious arguments, so as to render void the truth thereby, and to make My messages and warnings a target of their mockery.

And who could be more wicked than he to whom his Sustainer's messages are conveyed and who thereupon turns away from them, forgetting all [the evil] that his hands may have wrought? Behold, over their hearts have We laid veils which prevent them from grasping the truth, and into their ears, deafness; and though thou call them onto the right path, they will never allow themselves to be guided.

Yet, [withal,] thy Sustainer is the Truly-Forgiving One, limitless in His grace. Were He to take them [at once] to task for whatever [wrong] they commit, He would indeed bring about their speedy punishment [then and there]: but nay, they have a time-limit beyond which they shall find no redemption

as [was the case with all] those communities that We destroyed when they went on and on doing wrong: for We had set a time-limit for their destruction.

AND LO! [In the course of his wanderings,] Moses said to his servant: "I shall not give up until I reach the junction of the two seas, even if I [have to] spend untold years [in my quest]!"

But when they reached the junction between the two [seas], they forgot all about their fish, and it took its way into the sea and disappeared from sight.