"full of warning" (xxxviii. v. 1). In fact for a simple warning the Qur'an became in course of time rather varied and voluminous, so that we find the unbelievers saying, "If this Qur'an had been sent down to him all at once. . ." So also the Qur'an is said to come bil-hagq. In late passages this phrase means "with the truth", but its early sense is "with the Judgement", hagq being used in the same way as the Hebrew sedheq and sedhaqa are in Apocalyptic contexts. Before the end of the Meccan period the Qur'an comes to be associated with other things, but its association with warning is at first exclusive and a warning it continues to be right through.

It is an indication that this Apocalyptic material imposed itself upon Muhammad from the outside as it were, that it mingles in his mind with another idea, which, while not necessarily inconsistent with it, derives from a different sphere of thought, viz. that of a special judgement upon unbelievers. This latter was implied in his references to 'Ad and Thamud, and to Pharaoh and his hosts. But it was not immediately developed. For a time it is overlaid and thrust into the background by the other idea of the general Resurrection and Judgement, with the Torments of Hell and the Joys of Heaven to follow. All the imagery of Christian and Jewish Apocalyptic and Eschatology is used to enforce his message. Perhaps at first Muhammad did not clearly distinguish the two things. Or he may have been so absorbed in the Apocalyptic drama that the other idea fell for the time into the background. Ultimately the two things are

quite clearly distinguished and conjoined. It becomes a frequent statement that the unbelievers will suffer calamity in this world, and painful punishment in the world to come. The idea of the Last Judgement maintains itself to the end. But before the close of the Meccan period it passes into the realm of assured dogma in Muhammad's mind. The emotional fervour and poetic power dies away from his proclamation of it, and ultimately a great many of the details are dropped or at least taken for granted. In Medina he does not enter upon such full descriptions of the End of the World, or of the After Life, as he gives in Meccan passages. It is then sufficient to refer in general terms to these things as sanctions of other requirements which he wishes to enforce.

Though thus for a time in the early period of the composition of the Qur'an overshadowed, the idea of a special Calamity to fall upon the unbelievers of Mecca by no means disappeared. It asserted itself again alongside the other, and it soon began to find confirmation in the stories of former prophets. His own position in Mecca would stimulate his interest in accounts of others who had brought God's messages to their peoples, and we may conceive of him inquiring for such stories. 'Ad and Thamud perished, he discovers, for their disobedience to the prophets Hud and Salih. Whence these stories, which come to be related with considerable detail, were derived it is impossible to say. Muhammad is not likely to have invented them entirely. He probably found some Arab legends connected with the