Surah As-Sajdah: Thematic English Translation (Mustafa Çevik)

Alif. Lam. Mim. Without doubt this Quran, revealed in verses formed from the letters of your language, has been sent down by Allah, the Lord of all the worlds. Despite this truth, those who stubbornly persist in living as people who associate partners with Allah, because they will not accept the way of life to which they are invited through the Quran, say, “Muhammad makes it up himself and ascribes it to Allah.” No, it is not at all as they say. It has been sent to you from your Lord to make known the purpose of your creation and how you should live in keeping with it.

O Prophet! Call to this truth with the Quran a people to whom no prophet has been sent for a long time before you.

Allah is the sole holder of sovereignty, who created the heavens, the earth, and what is between them in six stages, established their orders, laid down the laws by which they work, and holds the seat of government in His hand.

You have neither a friend nor an intercessor besides Allah, and Allah has given no one authority to intercede (to help through mediation) for another. Those who hope for intercession from certain people and believe in it will in the end suffer ruin.

It is Allah who created the heavens and the earth and established their order. Then the knowledge of everything that takes place there reaches the presence of Allah (who is above time) in a day that is, by your reckoning, a thousand years.

Allah knows everything visible, invisible, and beyond human comprehension; His knowledge encompasses everything; He is the source of compassion and mercy; He has power over everything.

Allah has created everything He has created in the finest form and in its proper place. He began the creation of the human being from clay, then turned him into a seed whose essence is fluid, and bound to it the law by which the human race multiplies. Then He endowed him with organs to fulfill the purpose of his creation, gave him his form, and breathed spirit into him (inscribed his innate nature in him). How little you give thanks to Allah, who has created for you eyes to see, ears to hear the truths, and hearts able to reflect, grasp the truth by reason, and feel it!

Though most people see the many blessings Allah has created, witness His knowledge and power, and hear the truths, they do not use their reason and consider that Allah can raise the human being again after his death. In truth they imagine that by not believing in this they can escape giving account to Allah.

Say to them: “Whether you accept these truths or not, the angel of death who has been charged with you will take your souls when the day comes, and then you will all be gathered in your Lord’s presence to give account.”

O Prophet! If only you could see those stubborn, ungrateful deniers on the Day of Reckoning, hanging their heads and pleading and imploring, “Our Lord! Though it is very late, we have understood that being raised after death is real. If You were to send us back to the world, we would be among those who live by responding to Your call.”

We have made known to the human being truth and falsehood and left the choice to him. Had We willed, We would have created him without free will and compelled him to follow Our call. Without doubt We will bring to light those who obey Allah and those who are ungrateful and rebellious, and We will fulfill Our word: “I will surely fill Hell with the humans and jinn who follow Satan.”

On the Day of Reckoning those who have deserved Hell will be told: “Though you were told that you would meet this day, you disregarded the warnings, stopped your ears, refused to accept it, and forgot it. So today We will pay no heed to your pleading and imploring to be saved from the punishment, and so you will suffer the penalty for what you did.”

Those who believe wholeheartedly in Allah’s call and are conscious of their responsibilities toward Allah, when His verses reach them, never grow arrogant or give themselves airs of greatness, but at once fall down in prostration, pledging to fulfill what they require, and take refuge in their Lord’s greatness and power.

They rise reverently from their beds at night and pray to attain their Lord’s compassion and mercy, and they spend in His way from the blessings Allah has bestowed on them.

You cannot even imagine the perfection of the blessings Allah has prepared in the Gardens for those who live their worldly lives with this faith and these righteous deeds.

Can those who grasp Allah as He deserves, believe in His call, and fulfill their responsibilities ever be the same as those who are ungrateful to Him and turn away from His call?

For those who believe and do righteous deeds, the Gardens of Refuge (Mawa) and mansions await, in which they will rest and find peace.

The destination of those who turn away from Allah’s call is Hell. Whenever they try to get out of the fire of Hell, they are thrust back into it and told, “Suffer the punishment of Hell, which you called a lie and would not accept.”

We warn people in the world with lesser hardships and upheavals before that great punishment of Hell in the Hereafter, so that they may use their reason, reflect, and turn to what is right.

Who could be more ungrateful, ignorant, and unjust than those who, when their Lord’s verses are recited and conveyed to them, turn away from them and turn their backs? Allah will surely exact retribution from such people.

O Prophet! We had revealed to Moses too what We have revealed to you, and given him the Book, and made it a guide for the Children of Israel.

Whenever the Children of Israel believed in Our verses and, for that reason, bore with patience the attacks and oppression inflicted on them, We raised up from among them leaders who called people to the right path.

Without doubt Allah will call those who associate partners with Him and deny the truth to account in the Hereafter too for their aggression and oppression against the believers, and make them suffer the penalty they deserve. Do those who have conditioned themselves to deny the truth never think to take a lesson and listen to Our call, though they pass through the lands of those who lived before them and have heard what befell them? Do such people never turn and look at how We grow, with the rain We send down, the plants on which they and their animals feed, and use their reason? While on the one hand they turn their backs on all these truths and ignore them, on the other they mock the believers, saying, “When is this Day of Resurrection and Reckoning you threaten us with?”

Say to them: “When the Day of Resurrection and Reckoning comes upon you, it will be of no use to you at all to say, ‘We have understood and grasped the truth; we too believe.’”

Carry out your task of inviting them, in Allah’s name, to live in keeping with the reason for their creation; then leave them to themselves, and let them wait for their end.