The Quran

146

Preface

سَأَصرِفُ عَن آياتِيَ الَّذينَ يَتَكَبَّرونَ فِي الأَرضِ بِغَيرِ الحَقِّ وَإِن يَرَوا كُلَّ آيَةٍ لا يُؤمِنوا بِها وَإِن يَرَوا سَبيلَ الرُّشدِ لا يَتَّخِذوهُ سَبيلًا وَإِن يَرَوا سَبيلَ الغَيِّ يَتَّخِذوهُ سَبيلًا ۚ ذٰلِكَ بِأَنَّهُم كَذَّبوا بِآياتِنا وَكانوا عَنها غافِلينَ

Yusuf Ali

Those who behave arrogantly on the earth in defiance of right - them will I turn away from My signs:¹ Even if they see all the signs, they will not believe in them; and if they see the way of right conduct, they will not adopt it as the way; but if they see the way of error, that is the way they will adopt. For they have rejected² our signs, and failed to take warning from them.

The argument may be simplified thus in paraphrase. The right is established on the earth as God created it: Nature recognises and obeys God’s law as fixed for each portion of Creation. But man, because of the gift of Will, sometimes upsets this balance. The root-cause is his arrogance, as it was in the case of Iblis. God’s Signs are everywhere, but if they are rejected with scorn and blasphemy, God will withdraw His grace, for sin hardens the heart and makes it impervious to the truth. Want of faith produces a kind of blindness to spiritual facts, a kind of deafness to the warnings of a Day of Account. If we had contumaciously rejected faith, can we hope for anything but justice?the just punishment of our sins? (R).
Rejected Our Signs: again a return to the Plural of impersonal Dignity and Authority, from the singular of personal concern in granting grace and guidance to the righteous.