“Or is He who originates creation, then brings it back again, and who provides for you from heaven and earth? Is there a god besides Allah? Say, ‘Bring forth your proof, if you are truthful.’ (64) Say, ‘No one in the heavens and the earth knows the unseen except Allah; nor do they perceive when they will be resurrected.’ (65)”

“Or who answers the distressed”—the grief-stricken and exhausted—“when he calls upon Him, and removes harm”—that is, affliction (1)—“and makes you successors on the earth”: its inhabitants. He destroys one generation and brings forth another. It was also said: He makes your children your successors. And it was said: He made you successors to the jinn on the earth.

“Is there a god besides Allah? How little you take heed!” Abu Amr recited it with the third-person prefix, while the others recited it with the second-person prefix (2).

“Or who guides you through the darknesses of land and sea,” when you travel, “and who sends the winds as glad tidings before His mercy”—that is, ahead of the rain—“is there a god besides Allah? Exalted is Allah above whatever they associate with Him.”

“Or who originates creation, then brings it back again,” after death, “and who provides for you from heaven and earth”—that is, rain from heaven and vegetation from the earth. “Is there a god besides Allah? Say, ‘Bring forth your proof’”: your evidence for your claim that there is another god besides Allah, “if you are truthful.”

“Say, ‘No one in the heavens and the earth knows the unseen except Allah.’” This was revealed concerning the idolaters, when they asked the Prophet, may Allah’s peace and blessings be upon him, about the time when the Hour would come (3). “Nor do they perceive when they will be resurrected.”