Page:Sacred Books of the East - Volume 9.djvu/73

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ⅩⅫ, 6-17.
the chapter of the pilgrimage.
57

He quickens the dead, and because He is mighty over all; and because the Hour is coming, there is no doubt therein, and because God raises up those who are in the tombs.

And amongst men is one who wrangles about God without knowledge or guidance or an illuminating book; twisting his neck from the way of God ; for him is disgrace in this world, and we will make him taste, upon the resurrection day, the torment of burning.

10 That is for what thy hands have done before, and for that God is not unjust unto His servants.

And amongst men is one who serves God (wavering) on a brink; and if there befall him good, he is comforted ; but if there befall him a trial, he turns round again, and loses this world and the next — that is an obvious loss. He calls, besides God, on what can neither harm him nor profit him; — that is a wide error.

He calls on him whose harm is nigher than his profit,— a bad lord and a bad comrade.

Verily, God makes those who believe and do aright enter into gardens beneath which rivers flow ; verily, God does what He will.

15 He who thinks that God will never help him in this world or the next — let him stretch a cord to the roof[1] and put an end to himself ; and let him cut it and see if his stratagem will remove what he is enraged at.

Thus have we sent down manifest signs; for, verily, God guides whom He will.

Verily, those who believe, and those who are


  1. The word may also be rendered ‘ sky.’