68 Preface وَالَّذينَ لا يَدعونَ مَعَ اللَّهِ إِلٰهًا آخَرَ وَلا يَقتُلونَ النَّفسَ الَّتي حَرَّمَ اللَّهُ إِلّا بِالحَقِّ وَلا يَزنونَ ۚ وَمَن يَفعَل ذٰلِكَ يَلقَ أَثامًاYusuf AliThose who invoke not, with God, any other god, nor slay such life as God has made sacred except for just cause, nor commit1 fornication; - and any that does this (not only) meets punishment.Here three things are expressly condemned: (1) false worship, which is a crime against God; (2) the taking of life, which is a crime against our fellow creatures; and (3) fornication, which is a crime against our self-respect, against ourselves. Every crime is against God, His creatures, and ourselves, but some may be viewed more in relation to one than to another. The prohibition against taking life is qualified: “except for just cause”: e.g., in judicial punishment for murder, or in self-preservation, which may include not only self-defense in the legal sense, but also the clearing out of pests, and the provision of meat under conditions of Halal: see n. 698 to 5:5. After this comes a long parenthesis, which ends with verse 71, below.