# Sura  70 - The Steps or Ascents

*Exported from [Holy-Writings.com](https://www.holy-writings.com/) on 2026-06-18 — 1 clipping.*

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> SURA LXX (70)  - The Steps or Ascents (Mecca - 44 verses)       (XLVII - 72)  
>  
>        In the Name of God, the Compassionate, the Merciful
>  
>        A suitor sued for punishment to light suddenly
>  
>        On the infidels:  None can hinder
>  
>        God from inflicting it, the master of those Ascents,
>  
>        By which the angels and the spirit ascend to him in a day, whose length
> is fifty thousand years.
>  
>        Be thou patient therefore with becoming patience;
>  
>        They forsooth regard that day as distant,
>  
>        But we see it nigh:
>  
>        The day when the heavens shall become as molten brass,
>  
>        And the mountains shall become like flocks of wool:
>  
> 70:10  And friend shall not question of friend,
>  
>        Though they look at one another.  Fain would the wicked redeem himself
> from punishment on that day at the price of his children,
>  
>        Of his spouse and his brother,
>  
>        And of his kindred who shewed affection for him,
>  
>        And of all who are on the earth that then it might deliver him.
>  
>        But no.  For the fire,
>  
>        Dragging by the scalp,
>  
>        Shall claim him who turned his back and went away,
>  
>        And amassed and hoarded.
>  
>        Man truly is by creation hasty;
>  
> 70:20  When evil befalleth him, impatient;
>  
>        But when good falleth to his lot, tenacious.
>  
>        No so the prayerful,
>  
>        Who are ever constant at their prayers;
>  
>        And of whose substance there is a due and stated portion
>  
>        For him who asketh, and for him who is ashamed to beg;
>  
>        And who own the judgment-day a truth,
>  
>        And who thrill with dread at the chastisement of their Lord -
>  
>        For there is none safe from the chastisement of their Lord -
>  
>        And who control their desires,
>  
> 70:30  (Save with their wives or the slaves whom their right hands have won,
> for there they shall be blameless;
>  
>        But whoever indulge their desires beyond this are transgressors);
>  
>        And who are true to their trusts and their engagements,
>  
>        And who witness uprightly,
>  
>        And who keep strictly the hours of prayer:
>  
>        These shall dwell, laden with honours, amid gardens.
>  
>        But what hath come to the unbelievers that they run at full stretch
> around thee,
>  
>        On the right hand and on the left, in bands?
>  
>        Is it that every man of them would fain enter that garden of delights?
>  
>        Not at all.  We have created them, they know of what.
>  
> 70:40  It needs not that I swear by the Lord of the East and of the West that
> we have power
>  
>        To replace them with better than themselves:  neither are we to be
> hindred.
>  
>        Wherefore let them flounder on and disport them, till they come face to
> face with their threatened day,
>  
>        The day on which they shall flock up out of their graves in haste like
> men who rally to a standard: -
>  
>        Their eyes downcast; disgrace shall cover them.  Such their threatened
> day.
>
> — *Sura  70 - The Steps or Ascents*