Surah “The Sundering, Splitting Open”

as rendered by John Medows Rodwell — 25 verses

WHEN the Heaven shall have SPLIT ASUNDER
And duteously obeyed its Lord
And when Earth shall have been stretched out as a plain
And shall have cast forth what was in her and become empty
And duteously obeyed its Lord
Then verily, O man, who desirest to reach thy Lord, shalt thou meet him
And he into whose right hand his Book shall be given
Shall be reckoned with in an easy reckoning
And shall turn, rejoicing, to his kindred
But he whose Book shall be given him behind his back
Shall invoke destruction
But in the fire shall he burn
For that he lived joyously among his kindred
Without a thought that he should return to God
Yea, but his Lord beheld him
It needs not therefore that I swear by the sunset redness
And by the night and its gatherings
And by the moon when at her full
That from state to state shall ye be surely carried onward
What then hath come to them that they believe not
And that when the Koran is recited to them they adore not
Yea, the unbelievers treat it as a lie
But God knoweth their secret hatreds
Let their only tidings be those of painful punishment
Save to those who believe and do the things that be right. An unfailing recompense shall be theirs