Surah 28. Al-Qasas, Ayah 58

Lit., "We are indeed (kunna) the inheritors". For an explanation of my rendering of this phrase, see note [22] on 15:23 . The above passage stresses the insignificance and brittleness of all worldly "advantages" as compared with the imperishable good of divine guidance.

 By travellers such as the Meccan pagans.

A life of ease and plenty is nothing to boast of. Yet peoples or cities or civilisations grow insolently proud of such things. There were many such in the past, which are now mere names! Their very sites are deserted in most cases, or buried in the debris of ages. India is full of such sites nearly everywhere. The sites of Harappa and Mohenjo Daro are the most ancient hitherto unearthed in India, and they are themselves in layers covering centuries of time! And how many more there may be, of which we do not know even names! Fatehpur-Sikri was a magnificent ruin within a single generation. And there are thousands of Qasbas once flourishing and now reduced to small villages or altogether deserted. But God is merciful and just. He does not destroy or degrade a people until they have had full opportunities of turning in repentance to Him and they have deliberately rejected His Law and continued in the practice of iniquity.