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318 With Love to Muhammad sa the Khātam-un-Nabiyyīn
This means that: ‘Those who are disbelievers and reject Our
signs are condemned to the fire and shall abide therein forever.’
Thus, as the punishment of rejection of a Divine Book is so
severe and the phenomenon of prophethood and divine
revelation is so difficult of comprehension, indeed God
Almighty Himself is so transcendent that unless the human eye
is illumined by divine light it is not possible to achieve true and
holy comprehension of Him, let alone the comprehension of
prophets and divine books, therefore, the Rahmāniyyah of God
demanded that His blind and unseeing creatures should be
helped very greatly, and it should not be considered enough
that a messenger and a Book having been sent, thereafter,
despite the passage of a long period of time, the disbelievers
may be committed to the everlasting torment of hell on account
of the denial of such doctrines as later generations can
comprehend as merely pure and excellent statements.
It should be clear to a thoughtful person that God, Who is
Rahmān [Gracious] and Rahīm [Merciful], cannot, without
convincing explanation, prescribe so great a punishment as
condemnation to everlasting hell for people of different
countries who have heard of the Qur’ān and of the Holy
Prophet sa after centuries and who, not being proficient in Arabic,
cannot perceive the excellence of the Holy Qur’ān. Nor can
human conscience reconcile itself to the fact that a person may
be condemned without being convinced that the Holy Qur’ān is
the Word of God. That is why God Almighty has promised that
He will continue to appoint vicegerents so that they, being
invested reflectively with the lights of prophethood, should
demonstrate the excellences of the Holy Qur’ān and its holy
317
Sūrah Al-Baqarah, 2:40