who has made the earth a resting-place for you and the sky a canopy, and has sent down water from the sky and thereby brought forth fruits for your sustenance: do not, then, claim that there is any power that could rival God,* when you know [that He is One].
And yet there are people who choose to believe in beings that allegedly rival God,* loving them as [only] God should be loved: whereas those who have attained to faith love God more than all else. If they who are bent on evildoing could but see - as see they will when they are made to suffer* [on Resurrection Day] -that all might belongs to God alone, and that God is severe in [meting out] punishment!
For, they claimed that there are powers that could rival God,* and so they strayed from His path. Say: "Enjoy yourselves [in this world], but, verily, the fire will be your journey's end!"
But those who had been weak will say unto those who had gloried in their arrogance: Nay, [what kept us away was your] devising of false arguments, night and day, [against God's messages- as you did]* when you persuaded us to blaspheme against God and to claim that there are powers that could rival Him!"* And when they see the suffering [that awaits them], they will [all] be unable to express [the full depth of] their remorse:* for We shall have put shackles around the necks of those who had been bent on denying the truth:* [and] will this be aught but a [just] requital for what they were doing?
NOW [thus it is:] when affliction befalls man, he is likely to cry out to his Sustainer, turning unto Him [for help];* but as soon as He has bestowed upon him a boon by His grace, he forgets Him whom he invoked before, and claims that there are other powers that could rival God* - and thus leads [others] astray from His path. Say [unto him who sins in this way]: Enjoy thyself for a while in this thy denial of the truth; [yet,] verily, thou art of those who are destined for the fire!
SAY: Would you indeed deny Him who has created the earth in two aeons?* And do you claim that there is any power that could rival Him, the Sustainer of all the worlds?"*