Texts of Islam

The Qur'ân, ed. Palmer (SBE9): LXX. The Chapter of the Ascents

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This is an excerpt from Surah Al-Ma'arij (The Ascending Stairways), Chapter 70 of the Qur'an, drawn from E.H. Palmer's 1880 English translation in the Sacred Books of the East series — a Victorian scholarly project to render major world scriptures into English. The passage opens with a challenge to the Prophet Muhammad about divine punishment and affirms its inevitability for unbelievers, describing the Day of Judgment in vivid physical terms: the sky turned to molten brass, mountains dissolving like wool, and no human bonds — not family, not wealth — able to spare the guilty. A central argument is the moral taxonomy of humanity: most people are innately impatient and selfish when tested, but a righteous minority — those who pray, give alms, guard their chastity, honor obligations, and believe in judgment — will be rewarded with paradise. The passage is notably punitive in tone, dwelling on the dragging flames and scalp-scorching torment awaiting those who hoarded wealth or mocked the faith, and it dismisses the scoffing unbelievers with contempt rather than extended argument. Palmer's scholarly footnotes identify the historical figures whose taunts prompted the revelation and gloss the cosmological imagery (the fifty-thousand-year day, the "Lord of the ascents"), grounding the text in its 7th-century Arabian context.

The Qur'ân, ed. Palmer (SBE9): LXX. The Chapter of the Ascents

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