33–34. “Are they waiting for anything but that the angels should come to them, or that your Lord’s command should come? Those before them acted likewise. Allah did not wrong them, but they wronged themselves. The evil consequences of their deeds overtook them, and the very punishment they used to ridicule engulfed them.”

Allah Most High says: Are those to whom the signs came yet did not believe, and who were admonished yet did not take heed, waiting for anything “but that the angels should come to them” to take their souls, “or that your Lord’s command should come” with the punishment that will befall them? They have indeed deserved its coming upon them. “Those before them acted likewise”: they denied the truth and disbelieved, and they did not believe until the punishment descended upon them.

“Allah did not wrong them” when He punished them, “but they wronged themselves,” for their souls were ⦗440⦘ created to worship Allah so that their final end might be the honor bestowed by Allah. Yet they wronged their souls, forsook the purpose for which they had been created, and exposed them to perpetual humiliation and unremitting misery.

“The evil consequences of their deeds overtook them”—that is, the punishments resulting from their deeds and their effects—“and engulfed them,” meaning descended upon them, “the very punishment they used to ridicule.” Whenever their messengers warned them of the punishment, they ridiculed it and mocked those who warned them of it. Thus, the very thing they had mocked befell them.