The Quran

ذٰلِكُم بِأَنَّهُ إِذا دُعِيَ اللَّهُ وَحدَهُ كَفَرتُم ۖ وَإِن يُشرَك بِهِ تُؤمِنوا ۚ فَالحُكمُ لِلَّهِ العَلِيِّ الكَبيرِ

Muhammad Asad

[And they will be told:] "This [has befallen you] because, whenever the One God was invoked, you denied this truth; whereas, when divinity was ascribed to aught beside Him, you believed [in it]! But all judgment rests with God, the Exalted, the Great!"¹

An answer to the sinners' question at the end of the preceding verse may be found in the following extremely well-authenticated, parabolic saying of the Prophet: "[On the Day of Judgment,] those who deserve paradise will enter paradise, and those who deserve the fire, the fire. Thereupon God, the Sublimely Exalted, will say, 'Take out [of the fire] everyone in whose heart there was as much of faith [or, in some versions, "as much of good"] as a grain of mustard seed!' And so they will be taken out of it, already blackened, and will be thrown into the River of Life; and then they will come to life [lit., 'sprout'] as a herb sprouts by the side of a stream: and didst thou not see how it comes out, yellow and budding?" (Bukhari, on the authority of Abu Sa'id al-Khudri, in Kitab al-Iman and Kitab Bad' al-Khalq; also Muslim, Nasa'i and Ibn Hanbal.) The characterization as "yellow and budding" - i.e., tender and of light colour - indicates the freshness of new life in the pardoned sinner. This, of course, has nothing to do with the sinners futile - because meaningless - request on Judgment Day to be given a "second chance" on earth (Cf. 6:27-28 or 32:12). See also last but one sentence of 6:128 and the corresponding note 114.