Dokuzuncu Şuâ/en

[The first part of an important addendum to the Tenth Word]

In the Name of God, the Merciful, the Compassionate.

So [give] glory to God, when you reach eventide and when you rise in the morning; Yea, to Him be praise, in the heavens and on earth; and in the late afternoon and when the day begins to decline. It is He Who brings out the living from the dead, and brings out the dead from the living, and Who gives life to the earth after it is dead: and thus shall you be brought out [from the dead]. Among His Signs is this, that He created you from dust; and then,— behold, you are men scattered [far and wide]! And among His Signs is this, that He created for you mates from among yourselves, that you may dwell in tranquillity with them, and He has put love and mercy between your [hearts]: verily in that are Signs for those who reflect. And among His Signs is the creation of the heavens and the earth, and the variations in your languages and your colours: verily in that are Signs for those who know. And among His Signs is the sleep that you take by night and by day, and the quest that you [make for livelihood] out of His bounty: verily in that are Signs for those who hearken. And among His Signs, He shows you the lightning, by way both of fear and of hope, and He sends down rain from the sky and with it gives life to the earth after it is dead: verily in that are Signs for those who are wise. And among His Signs is this, that heaven and earth stand by His command: then when He calls you, by a single call, from the earth, behold, you [straightway] come forth. To Him belongs every being that is in the heavens and on earth: all are devoutly obedient to Him. It is He Who begins [the process of] creation; then repeats it; and for Him it is most easy. To Him belongs the loftiest similitude [we can think of] in the heavens and the earth; for He is Exalted in Might, Full of Wisdom.(*)

In this Ninth Ray will be expounded a supreme point of these sublime heavenly verses, which demonstrate one of the ‘poles’ of belief; these mighty sacred proofs of the resurrection of the dead will be explained.

It is a subtle instance of dominical grace that thirty years ago at the end of his work entitled Muhâkemat (Reasonings), which was written to set out the principles of Qur’anic exegesis, the Old Said wrote: “Second Aim: Two Qur’anic verses alluding to the resurrection of the dead will be expounded and explained. In the Name of God, the Merciful, the Compassionate.” There he stopped and could write no further. Now, praise and thanks be to my Compassionate Creator to the number of signs and indications of the resurrection, that thirty years later He gave me success.

Yes, nine or ten years ago, He bestowed the Tenth and Twenty-Ninth Words, two brilliant and powerful proofs expounding the Divine decree of: So look to the signs of God’s mercy, how He raises to life the earth after its death; He it is who will raise the dead to life, for He is Powerful Over All Things,(*)which was the first of the two verses. They silenced the deniers of resurrection.

Now, nine or ten years after those two impregnable bastions of belief in the resurrection of the dead, He bestowed with the present treatise a commentary on the second of the above two sublime verses. This Ninth Ray, then, consists of nine elevated ‘Stations’, indicated by the above-mentioned verses, and an important Introduction.

Introduction

[Two Points comprising a concise explanation of one comprehensive result of the numerous spiritual benefits of belief in resurrection and of its vital consequences; a demonstration of how essential it is for human life and especially for the life of society; a summary of one universal proof out of numerous proofs of the tenet of belief in the resurrection of the dead; and a statement of how indubitable and self-evident is that tenet of belief.]

FIRST POINT

We shall indicate, as a measure, only four out of hundreds of proofs that belief in the hereafter is fundamental to the life of society and to man’s personal life, and is the basis of his happiness, prosperity, and achievement.

The First: It is only with the thought of Paradise that children, who form almost a half of mankind, can endure all the deaths around them, which appear to them to be grievous and frightening, and strengthen the morale of their weak and delicate beings. With the thought of Paradise they find hope in their vulnerable spirits, prone to weeping, and may live happily. For example, thinking of Paradise, a child may say: “My little brother or friend has died and become a bird in Paradise. He is flying around Paradise and living more happily than us.”

The frequent deaths before their unhappy eyes of other children like themselves or of grown-ups will otherwise destroy all their resistance and morale, making their subtle faculties, such as their spirits, hearts, and minds, weep together with their eyes; they will either decline utterly or become crazy, wretched animals.

S e c o n d P r o o f : It is only through the life of the hereafter that the elderly, who form half of mankind, can endure the proximity of the grave, and be consoled at the thought that their lives, to which they are firmly attached, will soon be extinguished and their fine worlds come to an end. It is only with the hope of eternal life that they can respond to the grievous despair they feel in their emotional child-like spirits at the thought of death.

Those worthy, anxious fathers and mothers, so deserving of compassion and in need of tranquillity and peace of mind, will otherwise feel a terrible spiritual turmoil and distress in their hearts, and this world will become a dark prison for them, and life even, grievous torment.

Third Proof: It is only the thought of Hell-fire that checks the turbulent emotions of youths, the most vigorous element in the life of society, and their violent excesses, restraining them from aggression, oppression, and destruction, and ensuring that the life of society continues tranquilly.

If not for fear of Hell, in accordance with the rule ‘Might is right,’ in pursuing their desires, those drunken youths would turn the worlds of the wretched weak and powerless into Hell, and elevated humanity into base animality.

Fourth Proof: The most comprehensive centre of man’s worldly life, and its mainspring, and a paradise, refuge, and fortress of worldly happiness, is the life of the family. Everyone’s home is a small world for him. And the life and happiness of his home and family are possible through genuine, earnest, and loyal respect and true, tender, and self-sacrificing compassion. This true respect and genuine kindness may be felt due to the idea of the members of the family having an everlasting companionship and friendship and togetherness, and their parental, filial, brotherly, and friendly relations continuing for all eternity in a limitless life, and their believing this.

One says, for example: “My wife will be my constant companion in an everlasting world and eternal life. It does not matter if she is now old and ugly, for she will have an immortal beauty.” He will tell himself that he will be as kind and devoted as he can for the sake of that permanent companionship, and treat his elderly wife lovingly and kindly as though she was a beautiful houri.

A companionship that was to end in eternal separation after an hour or two of brief, apparent friendship would otherwise afford only superficial, temporary, feigned, animal-like feelings, and false compassion and artificial respect. As with animals, self-interest and other overpowering emotions would prevail over the respect and compassion, transforming that worldly paradise into Hell.

Thus, one of the hundreds of results of belief in resurrection is connected with the life of society. If a comparison is made between the above four proofs out of the hundreds of aspects and benefits of this single consequence and the rest, it will be understood that the realization of the truth of resurrection and its occurrence, are as certain as the elevated reality of humanity and its universal need. It is clearer even than the evidence for the existence of food offered by the existence of need in man’s stomach, and tells of its existence more clearly.

It proves too that if the consequences of the truth of resurrection were to quit humanity, whose nature is extremely significant, lofty, and living, it would descend to being a corrupt corpse fed on by microbes.

The sociologists, politicians, and moralists who govern mankind and are concerned with its social and moral questions should be aware of this! How do they propose to fill this vacuum? With what can they cure these deep wounds?

SECOND POINT

This explains in summary form a proof —one of many— proceeding from the testimony to the truth of resurrection of the other pillars of belief. It is as follows:

All the miracles indicating the messengership of Muhammad (Peace and blessings be upon him) and the evidences for his prophethood, and all the proofs of his veracity, together testify to the occurrence of the resurrection and prove it. For after Divine unity, everything he claimed throughout his life was centred on the resurrection of the dead. Also, all his miracles and proofs affirming, and making affirmed, all the previous prophets attest to the same truth.

Also, the testimony of the phrase “and in His Scriptures,” which makes completely clear the testimony of the phrase “and in His Prophets,” testifies to the same truth. Like this:

All the miracles, truths, and proofs proving foremost the veracity of the Qur’an of Miraculous Exposition, testify to and prove the realization and occurrence of resurrection. For almost a third of the Qur’an is about resurrection, and at the beginning of most of its short suras are powerful verses about it. It expresses the same truth explicitly and implicitly with thousands of its verses, and proves and demonstrates it. For example: When the sun is folded up.(*)* O men, fear your Sustainer; the trembling of the Hour is an awesome event;(*)* When the earth is convulsed;(*)* When the heavens are torn asunder;(*)* When the heavens are torn apart;(*)* Concerning what they dispute;(*)* Has the story reached you, of the overwhelming event?(*)Besides demonstrating with complete certainty at the beginning of thirty or forty suras that resurrection is the most important and necessary truth in the universe, it sets forth various persuasive evidences for that truth in others of its verses.

Is there any possibility that belief in the hereafter should be false, which emerges like the sun from the thousands of declarations and statements of a Book a single indication of one of the verses of which has yielded before our eyes the fruits of numerous learned and cosmic truths in the Islamic sciences?

Is there any possibility of denying the sun, or the existence of the universe? Would it not be impossible and absurd? Is it at all possible that although an army may sometimes be plunged into battle so that a mere sign of the king should not be given the lie, to show as false the thousands of words, promises, and threats of that most serious, proud monarch? Is it possible that they should be false?

Although a single sign of that glorious spiritual monarch who for thirteen centuries without break has ruled over innumerable spirits, minds, hearts, and souls within the bounds of truth and reality, and trained and educated them, would be sufficient to prove the truth of resurrection, it has demonstrated it with thousands of explicit statements. Is the torment of Hell-fire not necessary then for the compounded idiot who does not recognize this fact? Is it not pure justice?

Moreover, by their definite acceptance of the truth of resurrection, which the Qur’an —prevailing over the future and all times— repeatedly proves in detail and elucidates, all the revealed scriptures and sacred books, each of which dominated a particular period, proved it according to their own times and centuries, but in undetailed, veiled, and summary manner, confirming with a thousand signatures what the Qur’an teaches.

Included here since it is related to this discussion is the testimony at the end of the Third Ray of the other pillars of faith, and particularly “the Prophets” and “Holy Scriptures,” to “belief in the Last Day.” It forms a convincing proof of resurrection, and is in the form of a powerful yet succinct supplication which dispels all doubts. It says in the supplication:

“O My Compassionate Sustainer! “I have understood from the instruction of Your Noble Messenger (PBUH) and the teaching of the Qur’an, that foremost the Qur’an and the Messenger, and all the sacred scriptures and prophets, have unanimously testified and pointed out that the manifestations of the Names related to Your beauty and glory, examples of which are to be seen in this world, will continue even more radiantly for all eternity, and that Your bounties, samples of which are to be observed in this transitory world, will persist in the abode of bliss in still more glittering fashion, and that those who long for them in this world will accompany them for all eternity.

“Also, relying on hundreds of evident miracles and decisive signs, foremost Your Most Noble Messenger (Peace and blessings be upon him) and the All-Wise Qur’an, and the prophets with their luminous spirits, and the saints, who are spiritual poles with their light-filled hearts, and the purified scholars with their enlightened intellects, relying on Your repeated threats and promises in all the sacred scriptures, and trusting in Your sacred attributes such as power, mercy, favour, wisdom, glory, and beauty, and on Your qualities, and the dignity of Your glory, and the sovereignty of Your dominicality, and in consequence of their illuminations and visions and beliefs at the degree of ‘the knowledge of certainty,’ give the glad tidings to men and jinn of eternal happiness and inform them of Hell for the people of misguidance; they firmly believe this and testify to it.

“O All-Powerful and Wise One! O Most Merciful and Compassionate! O Munificent One True to His Promise! O All-Compelling One of Glory, One of Dignity, Grandeur, and Wrath! “You are utterly exempt from and exalted above giving the lie to so many loyal friends, and so many promises, and attributes and qualities, and denying the certain demands of the sovereignty of Your dominicality and the endless prayers and supplications of Your innumerable acceptable servants, whom You love and who attract Your love by assenting to You and obeying You; and You are exempt from confirming the denial of resurrection by the people of misguidance and unbelief, who through their disbelief and rebellion and denial of Your promises, offend the magnificence of Your grandeur and affront Your dignity and glory and the honour of Your Godhead, and sadden the compassion of Your dominicality. We declare Your justice, beauty, and mercy to be exempt from such infinite tyranny, such ugliness.

We believe with all our strength that the testimony of the prophets, purified scholars, and saints, who are those truthful envoys of Yours, those heralds of Your sovereignty, at the degrees of ‘absolute certainty,’ ‘knowledge of certainty,’ and ‘the vision of certainty,’ to the treasuries of Your mercy in the hereafter and the stores of Your bounties in the everlasting realm, and to the wondrously beautiful manifestations of Your Beautiful Names, which will be manifested totally in the abode of bliss, are absolutely true and veracious, and what they have indicated conforms absolutely with reality, and that what they have given glad tidings of is true and will occur. Believing that the supreme ray of Your Name of Truth, which is the source, sun, and protector of all realities, is this truth of the resurrection and Great Gathering, they teach it to Your servants.”

O God! For the sake of what they teach and in veneration of it, grant us and all students of the Risale-i Nur perfect belief and a happy death. And allow us to receive their intercession. Amen!

Moreover, just as all the proofs demonstrating the veracity of the revealed scriptures, and all the miracles and evidences proving the prophethood of God’s Beloved (PBUH) and of all the prophets, indirectly prove the reality of the hereafter, which is what they teach above all else; so most of the evidences for the existence and unity of the Necessary Existent testify indirectly to the existence and opening up of an eternal realm of bliss, which will be the supreme manifestation of dominicality and divinity.

For as is explained and proved in the following paragraphs, both the existence of the Necessarily Existent One, and most of His attributes, qualities and Names, such as dominicality, Godhead, mercy, grace, wisdom, and justice, necessitate the hereafter with the utmost certainty, and demand an eternal realm and the resurrection of the dead and Last Judgement for the granting of reward and punishment.

Since there is a pre-eternal and post-eternal God, most certainly there is the hereafter, the everlasting sphere of the sovereignty of His Godhead. And since there is in the universe and in living beings a most majestic and wise, a most compassionate and absolute dominicality, and it is apparent; there is certain to be an eternal realm of happiness which will save the majesty of that dominicality from abasement, its wisdom from purposelessness, and its compassion from cruelty; and that realm shall be entered.

And since the unlimited bestowals, bounties, favours, gifts, and instances of grace and mercy which are to be seen, show to minds that are not extinguished and hearts that are not dead that behind the veil of the Unseen is One All-Merciful and Compassionate; surely there is an immortal life in an eternal realm which will save the bestowal from mockery, the bounties from deception, the favours from enmity, the mercy from torment, the grace and gifts from treachery, and will make the bounties bounty and the bestowal bestowal.

And since in the springtime on the narrow page of the earth, a pen of power writes a hundred thousand books without error tirelessly before our eyes; and since the Holder of the pen has promised a hundred thousand times: “I am going to write a fine, immortal book in a broad realm, easier than this book of the spring written in this narrow realm, confused and intermingled, and I shall allow you to read it;” — since He mentions the book in all his decrees; certainly, the main part of the book has been written, and with the resurrection and Last Judgement its footnotes shall be added, and all the notebooks of people’s actions shall be recorded in it.

And since, with its multiplicity of creatures, the earth is the dwelling, source, factory, exhibition, and gathering place of hundreds of thousands of constantly changing species of living beings and beings with spirits, and is the heart, centre, summary, and result of the universe, and the reason for its creation; it has supreme importance, and is held equal to the mighty heavens despite its smallness; in the heavenly decrees, it is always said: Sustainer of the Heavens and Earth...

And since there is man, who rules over the earth, which is thus, has disposal over most creatures, and subjects most living beings gathering them around himself; and since he so orders, displays, and gathers each remarkable species together in one place like a list, adorning them, that he attracts not only the attention and admiration of men and jinn, but of the dwellers of the heavens and the universe, and the appreciative gaze of the universe’s Owner, thus gaining great importance and high worth; and since he shows through his sciences and arts that he is the purpose of the universe’s creation, and its most important result, and most precious fruit, and the Divine vicegerent on earth; and since because with respect to this world, he has ordered and displayed excellently the miraculous arts of the world’s Maker, he is left in this world despite his rebellion and disbelief, and his punishment is postponed, and because of this work of his, his term is prolonged and is allowed success...

And since there is an extremely powerful, wise, and compassionate Disposer Who makes the mighty globe into a treasury of every sort of metal and mineral that man needs in a way entirely beyond his strength and will —who despite being weak, impotent, and wanting by nature and creation, has innumerable needs and is subject to innumerable pains— and since He makes it into a store of every sort of food, and a shop stocking goods of every kind that pleases man, and looks to man in this way, and nurtures him, and gives him what he wants...

And since there is a Sustainer Who is thus, Who both loves man and causes man to love Him, and Who is enduring and has eternal worlds, and Who performs every work with justice and carries out everything with wisdom; and since the splendour of that Pre-Eternal Sovereign’s rule and His eternal dominion cannot be contained in this brief worldly life, and in man’s fleeting span, and in the temporary and transient earth;

and since the excessive wrongdoing and rebellion that occur among men, which are contrary to and opposed to the universe’s order, justice, balance, and beauty, and their denial, treachery, and disbelief towards their Benefactor, Who nurtures them tenderly,— since they are not punished in this world, and the cruel oppressor passes his life in ease while the unhappy oppressed live in hardship; and since the absolute justice whose traces are to be seen throughout the universe is entirely opposed to the cruel tyrant and despairing oppressed being equal in death, and would in no way permit it...

And since just as the universe’s Owner has chosen the earth from the universe, and man from the earth and bestowed on him a high rank and importance; so out of mankind He has chosen the prophets, saints, and purified ones, true human beings who conform to the aims of His dominicality and through their belief and submission make Him love them; He has taken them as friends and addressees, and bestowed miracles and success on them and punished their enemies with heavenly blows.

And out of these worthy and lovable friends He has chosen their leader and source of pride, Muhammad (Peace and blessings be upon him), and for long centuries has illuminated with his Light half the globe and a fifth of humanity; as though the universe was created for him, all its purposes become apparent through him and his religion and the Qur’an.

And although he deserved to live for an infinite time in recompense for his infinitely valuable service, for millions of years, he only lived a brief sixty-three years of great hardship and striving. Is there any possibility then that he should not be resurrected together with all his peers and friends? That they should not now be living in the spirit? That they should have been annihilated eternally? God forbid, a hundred thousand times! Yes, all the universe and the reality of the world demand that he should be resurrected and they beseech the universe’s Owner that he should be living...

And since in the Seventh Ray, The Supreme Sign, each with the strength of a mountain, the thirty-three powerful consensuses have proved that the universe emerged from a single hand and is the property of a single being; and have demonstrated self-evidently His unity and oneness, the means of the Divine perfections; and through unity and oneness all beings become like soldiers under orders and subservient officials; and with the coming of the hereafter, perfections are saved from decline, absolute justice from mocking cruelty, universal wisdom from foolish absurdity, all-embracing mercy from jeering torment, and the dignity of power from abased impotence, and they are exonerated from this...

Certainly and without any doubt, as necessitated by the truths in these six ‘sinces’ —six out of hundreds of points of belief in God— the end of the world shall come and the resurrection of the dead occur. Abodes of reward and punishment shall be thrown open so that the above-mentioned importance of the earth, and its centrality, and man’s importance and value shall be realized, and the above-mentioned justice, wisdom, mercy, and sovereignty of the All-Wise Disposer, Who is the Creator of the earth and of man, and their Sustainer, shall be established; and the true and yearning friends of that eternal Sustainer shall be saved from eternal annihilation; and the most eminent and worthy of those friends receive the recompense for his sacred services, which have made all beings pleased and indebted; and the perfections of the Eternal Sovereign should be exempted and exonerated from all fault and deficiency, and His power from impotence, and His wisdom from foolishness, and His justice from tyranny.

In Short: Since God exists, so does the hereafter certainly exist.

Moreover, just as with all the evidences that prove them, the above three pillars of belief testify to and indicate resurrection; so do the two pillars “and in the angels, and in Divine Determining, that both the good of it and the evil of it are from God Almighty” also necessitate resurrection and testify in powerful fashion to the eternal realm. It is like this:

All the evidences proving the existence of the angels and their duties of worship, and innumerable observations of them and conversations with them, prove indirectly the existence of the Spirit World, and the World of the Unseen, and the eternal realm and world of the hereafter, and the existence of an abode of happiness and Paradise and Hell, which in the future shall be populated with men and jinn. For with Divine permission, the angels can see these worlds and enter them. And all the high-ranking angels who meet with humans, like Gabriel, tell unanimously of the existence of these worlds and of their travelling round them. Just as we are certain, due to the information of those coming from there, that the continent of America exists, although we have not seen it, so due to information about the angels, which has the strength of a hundredfold consensus, we should believe with the same certainty in the existence of the world of eternity, the realm of the hereafter, and Paradise and Hell. And so we do believe in it.

Furthermore, all the evidences proving the pillar of “belief in Divine Determining,” included in the Treatise On Divine Determining, the Twenty-Sixth Word, prove indirectly the resurrection of the dead, the balancing of deeds on the supreme scales, and the publishing of the pages of deeds. For the recording before our eyes of the appointed courses of all things on the tablets of order and balance, and the inscribing of the life-stories of all living beings in their faculties of memory, and the transcribing of the notebooks of deeds of all beings with spirits, and especially men, on the Preserved Tablet, such a comprehensive determining and wise apportioning and precise recording and preserving inscription could surely only be the result of a general judgement in a supreme tribunal set up to deal out permanent reward and punishment. That comprehensive and precise recording and preservation would otherwise be completely meaningless and purposeless, and contrary to wisdom and reality.

Also, if there were no resurrection, all the certain meanings of the book of the universe, written with the pen of Divine Determining, would be nullified, which is completely impossible. It is as impossible as denying the universe’s existence, indeed, is a delirium.

In Short: With all their evidences the five pillars of belief demand the occurrence of the resurrection and Last Judgement, and their existence, and the existence and opening up of the realm of the hereafter, and they testify to these and necessitate them. Thus, it is because there are such vast and unshakeable supports and proofs of the resurrection, completely in conformity with its vastness, that almost one third of the Qur’an of Miraculous Exposition is formed by resurrection and the hereafter, and it makes it the basis and foundation stone of all its truths, and constructs everything on it.

(The end of the Introduction)

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Yedinci Şuâ ⇐ | Şualar | ⇒ On Birinci Şuâ

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