Page:Sacred Books of the East - Volume 6.djvu/203

Ⅳ, 35-40. , we will cover your offences and make you enter with a noble entrance.

And do not covet that by which God has preferred one of you over another. The men shall have a portion of what they earn, and the women a portion of what they earn ; ask God for His grace, verily, God knows all.

To every one have we appointed kinsfolk as heirs of what parents and relatives and those with whom ye have joined right hands leave; so give them their portion, for, verily, God is over all a witness.

Men stand superior to women in that God hath preferred some of them over others, and in that they expend of their wealth : and the virtuous women, devoted, careful (in their husbands') absence, as God has cared for them. But those whose perverseness ye fear, admonish them and remove them into bedchambers and beat them ; but if they submit to you, then do not seek a way against them ; verily, God is high and great.

And if ye fear a breach between the two, then send a judge from his people and a judge from her people. If they wish for reconciliation, God will arrange between them ; verily, God is knowing and aware.

And serve God, and do not associate aught with Him ; and to your parents show kindness, and to kindred, and orphans, and the poor, and the neighbour who is akin, and the neighbour who is a stranger, and the companion who is strange, and the son of the road, and what your right hands possess, verily, God loves not him who is proud and boastful ;