2006, IV - The Muslim Sunrise

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will burn in Hell. Then it will be said tothem, “this is what you used to reject.”(83:11-18). Then evil was the end of thosewho did evil, because they rejected the Signsof Allah, and mocked at them (30:11).”Signs of Allah Will NeverCease to ComeThe Holy Qur’an narrates many earthly andheavenly Signs as indicators for recognizing theLatter Days when the Second Coming of theMessiah and the final triumph of Islam arepredicted to take place.Commenting on the verse ‘And nothingcould hinder Us from sending Signs, exceptthat the former people rejected them’(17:60), the editors of the Five VolumeEnglish Translation and Commentary write:“This verse beautifully states that heavenlySigns will never cease to appear. (It)proceeds to refute and demolish the onlypossible objection against the appearanceof the heavenly Signs. The objection is:When the people to whom the Signs werefirst shown did not profit by them, wherewas the warrant that their successors woulddo so? The arguments given to this objectionare: (a) If the rejection of heavenly Signshad been a reasonable ground, no Prophetafter the very first Prophet Adam wouldhave appeared. But this did not happen andfresh Prophets continued to appear in allages and fresh signs continued to be shownat their hands, which showed that therejection of the Signs never proved a barrierin the way of appearance of new Signs; (b)Prophets are sent in the world in order towarn wrong-doers of their aggressions andiniquities and of the impending divinepunishment in consequence of thoseiniquities. Any such punishment without aprevious warning and without showingSigns would be contrary to divine mercy.”(Vol. III, pp. 1444-1445).Those who believe in theSigns of AllahO children of Adam! If Messengers cometo you from among yourselves, rehearsingMy Signs unto you, then whoso shall fearGod and do good deeds, on them shall comeno fear nor shall they grieve (7:36). Someof the rewards bestowed upon those whoaccept the Signs of Allah are: Mercy andforgiveness (6:54); steadfastness,resignation in God’s will (7:127); fear ofGod, holding Him in reverence (23:59);True believers are only those whose heartstremble when the name of Allah ismentioned, and when His Signs are recitedto them they increase their faith, and whoput their trust in their Lord. Who observeprayer and spend out of that which We haveprovided for them. These it is who are truebelievers. They have grades of ranks withtheir Lord, as well as forgiveness and anhonorable provision (8:3-4). These are thepeople on whom Allah bestowed Hisblessings from among the Prophets, of theposterity of Adam, and of those whom Wecarried in the Ark with Noah, and of theposterity of Abraham and Israel; and theyare those whom We guided and chose. Whenthe Signs of Gracious God were recited untothem, they fell down, prostrating themselvesbefore God and weeping (19:59). And Wemade among them leaders, who guidedothers by Our command, while theythemselves were steadfast and had firm faithin Our Signs (32:25). O My servants, thereis no fear for you this day, nor shall yougrieve; (you) believed in Our Signs andsubmitted. Enter you the Garden, you andyour wives, honored and happy (43:69-71).Signs of the Latter DaysThe Holy Qur’an narrates many earthlyand heavenly Signs as indicators forrecognizing the Latter Days when theSecond Coming of the Messiah and the finaltriumph of Islam are predicted to take place.The Holy Qur’an reinforces the Signsdocumented in some previous Scriptures. Inthe New Testament, for example, some ofSigns were foretold by Jesus about thecoming of the Son of man:“Immediately after the tribulation ofthose days shall the sun shall bedarkened, and the moon shall not give herlight, and the stars shall fall from heaven,and the powers of the heavens shall beshaken: And then shall appear the signof the Son of man in heaven: and thenshall all the tribes of the earth mourn, andthey shall see the Son of man coming inthe clouds of heaven with power and greatglory. And he shall send his angels with agreat sound of a trumpet, and they shallgather together his elect from the fourwinds, from one end of the heaven to theother (Matt. 24:30, 31). And greatearthquakes shall be in divers places, andfamines, and pestilences; and fearfulsights and great signs shall there be fromheaven (Luke 21:11).”In the Holy Qur’an, similar andadditional Signs are given. For example,in Sura Al-Takwir, Chapter 81, thefollowing Signs are mentioned: Specialeclipses of the sun and the moon; religiousleaders (the stars) becoming corrupt andlosing their spiritual light; the mountainsblown away and passages made throughthem; replacement of camels by better andswifter means of transportation; animalsgathered together; primitive people settlesin organized colonies; flow of riversdiverted and linked through canals; largebattles-ships fighting in open seas; seawatersgetting ablaze with fire; oceansjoined together; mass immigrations of ruralpopulations towards urban areas;interaction and intercommunicationbecoming fast; vast and rapid circulationof printed material; amazing progress insciences and technology; global wars andwidespread natural catastrophes. Then,after a long moral decline, the reemergenceof Islam shall occur. The spiritual darknessshall be dispelled and a brilliant new dayshall dawn on Islam through the PromisedMessiah – appearing from the East.“And say: ‘All praise belongs to Allah;He will soon show you His signs, and youwill know them.’ And your Lord is nounaware of what you do (27:94); Soon Wewill show them Our Signs in all parts ofthe earth, and among their own peopleuntil it becomes manifest to them that it isthe truth. Is it not enough that your Lordis Witness over all things?” (41:54)* Note: Most of the Qur’anic quotationsare taken from the English translation byMaulwi Sher Ali, published by IslamInternational Publications Limited. TheSuras and Verse numbers are indicatedin parentheses. For example, (7:175)indicates Chapter 7 of the Qur’an andVerse number 175. The verse numberingincludes “In the Name of Allah, MostGracious, Ever Merciful” – the verse thatbegins nearly every Sura of the Qur’an –as the first verse.26 MuslimSunrise
Al Wassay and the Expanding UniverseThe Holy Qur’an invitesmankind to ponder on theuniverse that He has created.The Qur’an urges us to reflecton the Laws of Nature — withexamples drawn fromcosmology, physics, biologyand medicine — as signs forall men. For example theGlorious Qur’an says, “Do theynot then look at the camel,how it is created? And at theheaven, how it is raised high?Dr. Zia H. Shah and Dr. Lutfur RehmanHe is Allah, the creator, the Maker, the Fashioner. His are themost beautiful names. All that is in the heavens and the earthglorifies Him, and He is the Mighty, the Wise. (Al Hashr 59:25).And the heaven We built with our own powers and indeed We goon expanding it. (Al Dhariyat 51:48).The similitude of those who spend their wealth in the way ofAllah is like the similitude of a grain of corn which grows sevenears, in each ear a hundred grains. And Allah multiplies itfurther for whomsoever He pleases and Allah is Bountiful, All-Knowing. (Al Baqarah 2:262)The Holy Qur’an invites mankind to ponder on theuniverse that He has created. The Qur’an urges usto reflect on the Laws of Nature — with examplesdrawn from cosmology, physics, biology andmedicine — as signs for all men. For example theGlorious Qur’an says, “Do they not then look at thecamel, how it is created? And at the heaven, how it is raised high?And at the mountains how they are rooted, and at the earth how it isoutspread?” (Al-Ghashiyah 88:18-21) In Sura Rahman He says,“The Gracious God. He taught the Qur’an. He created man, Andtaught him plain speech. The sun and the moon run their coursesaccording to a fixed reckoning. And the stem less plants and thetrees humbly submit to His Will. And the heaven He has raisedhigh and set up the measure. (Al Rahman 55:2-8)The earth on which we live is one of nine planets of a rathermediocre sun when we compare it with what else is out there. Allthe planets circle around the sun while at the same time continuallyspinning on their axes. Our sun around which these nine planetsare moving belongs to a galaxy made up of 100 billion other suns;the nearest of these suns is more than four light years away and themost distant 100,000 or more light years. A light year is the distancelight travels in a year at the rate of 186,000 miles a second. Thegalaxy to which the nine planets and our sun belongs is about100,000 light years in diameter and viewed from a remote point inspace would appear to be a spiral nebula, much like the pictures ofspiral nebulae to be seen at any planetarium.Edwin Powell Hubble (1889-1953) discovered in 1922–24 thatnot all nebulae in the sky are part of our galaxy called the MilkyWay Galaxy. He found that certain nebulae contain stars calledCepheid variables. By studying their relative distances, apparentmagnitude, and absolute magnitude, Hubble determined that theseCepheids are several hundred thousand light-years away and thusoutside the Milky Way system, and that the nebulae in which theyare located are actually galaxies distinct from the Milky Way.WINTER 2006 27
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2006, IV - The Muslim Sunrise

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