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Yet there be people who take to themselves compeers, idols, besides Allahu ta’ālā, that is, other than Allahu ta’ālā, loving them, by magnifying them and being subservient to them, as Allahu ta’ālā is loved, that is, as their love of Him; but those who believe love Allahu ta’ālā more ardently, than those who love their compeers, because the former never reject Allahu ta’ālā, whereas the latter when faced with hardship soon abandon those [compeers] for Allahu ta’ālā; If he, [if you] O Muhammad "sallallahu 'alayhi wa sallam" , were to see those who did evil, by taking to themselves compeers, when (idh here denotes idhā) they see (read either as active [yarawna, 'they see'] or passive [yurawna, 'they are made to see']) the chastisement, you would see a grave sight, that, this is because, the might, the power and the vanquishing, altogether (a circumstantial qualifier) belongs to Allahu ta’ālā, and that Allahu ta’ālā is terrible in chastisement (according to one reading, the person listening [to the verse] governs the verb yarā, 'he sees', and constitutes the subject [of the clause]; according to another [reading], it is the 'evildoers' [who constitute the subject of the clause and govern the verb yarā]; and so it [yarā] has the sense of ya'lam, 'he knows'; the particle an, 'that', and what comes after it have taken the place of the objects in both cases; the response to the [initial conditional] law, 'if', has been omitted). The general meaning [of the verse] then is: 'If they were aware in this world of the severity of Allah’s chastisement and of the fact that power is Allah’s alone, the moment they come to see it with their own eyes, on the Day of Resurrection, they would not take to themselves compeers'.