J. F. Campbell Collection > Koran: or, Alcoran of Mohammed

CTiAP. XXIII. AL KORAN. 283
again. This is no other than a man, who deviseth a lie concerning God :
but we will not believe him. T/ieir apostle said, Lord, defend me; for
that they have accused me of imposture. God answered, After a little while
they shall surely repent their obdinacy. "Wherefore a severe punishment
was justly inflicted on them, and we rendered them like the refuse iv/dch is
carried down hy a stream* Away therefore Avith the ungodly people !
Afterwards we raised up other generations' after them. No nation shall
be punished before their determined time; neither shall they be respited
after. Afterwards we sent our apostles, one after another. So often as
their apostle came into any nation, they charged him with imposture : and
we caused them successively to follow one another to destruction ; and we
made them only subjects o/" traditional stories.t Away therefore with the
unbelieving nations I Afterwards we sent Moses, and Aaron his brother,
with our signs and manifest power, unto Pharaoh and his princes : but they
proudly refused to believe on 1dm; for they were a haughty people. And
they said. Shall we believe on two men like unto ourselves; whose people
are our servants'? And they accused them of imposture : wherefore they
became of tlie number of those who were destroyed. And we heretofore
gave the book oftJie law unto Moses, that the children of Israel might be
dii-ected thereby. And we appointed the son of Mary, and his mother, for
a sign : and we prepared an abode for them in an elevated p:irt of the
earth,'" being a place of quiet and security, and watex-ed with running
springs. apostles, eat of those things which are good;'^ and work
righteousness : for I well know that which ye do. This your religion is
one religion;" and I am your Lord : wherefore fear me. But nien have
rent the affair of their religion into various sects : every party rejoiceth in
that which they follow. Wherefore leave them in their confusion, until
a certain time ^ Do they think that we hasten unto them the wealth
and children which we have abundantly bestowed on them, for their
good ? But ye do not understand. Verily they who stand in awe, for
fear of their Lord, and who believe in the signs of their Lord, and who
* '• The cry of the exterminating angel was heard, and, like withered buds, tlie
unbelievers were destroyed." — Savary.
' As the Sodomites, Midianites, &c.
f " We liave brought a new Scripture. Far from us be those who will not believe
in it." — Savary.
™ The commentators tell us the place here intended is Jerusalem, or Damascus,
or Ramlah, or Palestine, or Egypt.''
But perhaps the passage means the hill to which the virgin Mary retired to be
delivered, according to the Mchammedan tradition. '
" These words are addressed to the apostles in general, to whom it was permitted
to eat of all clean and whulesome food; and were spoken to them severally at the
time of their re.'^pective mission. Some, however, think them directed particularly
t" the virgin Mary and Jesus, or singly to the latter (in which case the plural num-
ber must be used out of respect only), propoiing the practice of the prophets for
their imitation. Mohammed probably designed in this passage to coudema the
abstmence observed bv the Christian niouks.^
" See cliiip 21, p 2)2.
P t. e.. Till they shall t/e slain, or shall die a natural death.
I
« Al Beidawi, Jallalo'ddin. 7 gee chap. 19, p. 249. * Al Beidawi.