Meccan, consisting of 19 verses.

When the heaven is split open, [when it is] rent asunder,

and when the stars are dispersed, [when] they expire and begin to fall,

and when the seas are burst forth, released one upon the other, forming one mass of water, so that the sweet [water] mixes with the salty;

and when the tombs are overturned, [when] their earth [above them] is dug up and its dead are raised (the response to idhā, ‘when’, and all that is supplemented thereto is [the following]):

a soul, every soul, will know, at the time of the [occurrence of the] things mentioned, which is the Day of Resurrection, what it has sent ahead, in the way of deeds, and, what [it has], left behind, of these and did not do.

O, disbelieving, man! What has deceived you with regard to your generous Lord?, so that you have disobeyed Him,

Who created you, when you were not, then made you upright, in your created form, with sound limbs, then proportioned you (read fa-‘adalak or fa-‘addalak), making you symmetrical in shape, with well-proportioned parts, so that no hand or leg is longer than the other,

assembling you in whatever (mā is a relative) form He will?

No indeed! — a deterrent against letting oneself be misled by the generosity of God, exalted be He. Rather you, that is, disbelievers of Mecca, deny Judgement, requital for deeds;

Yet lo! there are above you watchers, from among the angels, over your deeds,

noble, in God’s sight, writers, of these [deeds],

who know whatever you do, all of it.

Indeed the pious, the believers who are sincere in their faith, shall be amid bliss, [in] Paradise,

and indeed the profligates, the disbelievers, shall be in Hell-fire, a scorching fire,

entering it, to suffer its heat, on the Day of Judgement, [the Day of] Requital,

and they shall not be absent from it, [they shall not] be taken out of it.

And what would show you, [what would] inform you, what the Day of Judgement is?

Again, what would show you what the Day of Judgement is? — [repeated] to emphasise its enormity.

[It is] a day (read yawmu) when no soul will be of any avail, any use, to another soul, and the [absolute] command on that day will be God’s: there will be no [power of] command for anyone other than Him thereat, in other words, none has been given the power to mediate thereupon, in contrast to [situations] in this world.