Popular Translations
Muhammad Asad
BUT, ALAS, among those generations [whom We destroyed] before your time there were no people endowed with any virtue - [people] who would speak out against the [spread of] corruption on earth -except the few of them whom We saved [because of their righteousness], whereas those who were bent on evildoing only pursued pleasures which corrupted their whole being, and so lost themselves in sinning
Arthur John Arberry
Or if there had been, of the generations before you, men of a remainder forbidding corruption in the earth -- except a few of those whom We delivered of them; but the evildoers followed the ease they were given to exult in and became sinners
Yusuf Ali (Saudi Rev. 1985)
Why were there not, among the generations before you, persons possessed of balanced good sense, prohibiting (men) from mischief in the earth - except a few among them whom We saved (from harm)? But the wrong-doers pursued the enjoyment of the good things of life which were given them, and persisted in sin
Arabic
فَلَوۡلَا كَانَ مِنَ ٱلۡقُرُونِ مِن قَبۡلِكُمۡ أُو۟لُوا۟ بَقِیَّةࣲ یَنۡهَوۡنَ عَنِ ٱلۡفَسَادِ فِی ٱلۡأَرۡضِ إِلَّا قَلِیلࣰا مِّمَّنۡ أَنجَیۡنَا مِنۡهُمۡۗ وَٱتَّبَعَ ٱلَّذِینَ ظَلَمُوا۟ مَاۤ أُتۡرِفُوا۟ فِیهِ وَكَانُوا۟ مُجۡرِمِینَ ١١٦
Transliteration (2021)
falawlā kāna mina l-qurūni min qablikum ulū baqiyyatin yanhawna ʿani l-fasādi fī l-arḍi illā qalīlan mimman anjaynā min'hum wa-ittabaʿa alladhīna ẓalamū mā ut'rifū fīhi wakānū muj'rimīn