Read the Quran
- A doubter once demanded that punishment be immediately meted out,
- to those who deny the truth. No power can hinder God
- from punishing them. He is the Lord of the Ascending Stairways,
- by which the angels and the Spirit will ascend to Him in one Day which will last for fifty thousand years.
- Therefore, [O believers] behave with seemly patience.
- They see it [the Day of Judgement] to be far off,
- but We see it near at hand.
- On that Day the heavens shall become like molten brass,
- and the mountains will become like tufts of wool,
- and no friend will ask about his friend,
- though they shall be within sight of each other. The guilty one will gladly ransom himself from the torment of that Day by sacrificing his own children,
- his wife, his brother,
- and his kinsfolk who gave him shelter,
- and all the people of the earth, if that could deliver him.
- But no! There is a raging blaze
- stripping away his skin,
- and it will claim all those who turned their backs [on the true faith] and turned away [from the truth],
- and amassed wealth and hoarded it.
- Indeed, man is born impatient:
- when misfortune touches him he starts lamenting,
- and whenever good fortune comes to him, he grows niggardly.
- But not so the worshippers
- who are steadfast in prayer;
- those who give a due share of their wealth
- to those who ask [for help] and to the destitute;
- and those who believe in the Day of Judgement
- and are fearful of the punishment of their Lord;
- for none may ever feel secure from the punishment of their Lord;
- those who preserve their chastity
- except from their spouses and those whom they rightfully possess [through wedlock], for which they incur no blame—
- but those who go beyond that limit are transgressors;
- and those who are faithful to their trusts and to their pledges;
- and those who stand by their testimony
- and are steadfast in their prayers.
- They will be honoured in the Gardens of Bliss.
- But what is the matter with those who deny the truth, that they come hastening towards you
- from the right and from the left, in crowds?
- Does every one of them aspire to be admitted into a Garden of Delight?
- Certainly not! They know quite well out of what We created them.
- But nay! I call to witness the Lord of the Easts and the Wests, that We have the power
- to replace them with others better than them: nothing can prevent Us from doing this,
- so leave them to indulge in vain idle talk and amuse themselves, until they face the Day which they have been promised,
- the Day when they shall come out of their graves in haste, as if they were racing to a goal,
- with downcast eyes and faces distorted in shame; such is the Day which they are promised.
70:1-14
The scenes of Doomsday cannot either be revealed in reality or truly described in the present world. However, in the Quran, these have been allegorically conveyed by allusions and examples, so that man should have a brief idea of their significance. When Doomsday arrives, it will be so terrible that man will forget this relations and the interests to which he gives the utmost importance today and for which he ignores the Truth.
70:15-35
These verses give a brief description of the qualities of two types of human beings: those who will be treated as entitled to enter Paradise and those whose deeds will cause them to be thrown into Hell on Doomsday.
70:36-39
Those who stand by Untruth, feel that their high status is in jeopardy when the open and clear call to the Truth is delivered to them. In order to suppress this call, they try to smother it. Their unreasonable behaviour will take them straight to Hell, but with their false optimism, they go on thinking that they are fast approaching Paradise.
70:40
The periodic change in the places where the sun rises and sets on the earth’s horizon is due to that unique feature of the earth known as the axial tilt. This plus the fact that the sun is at one of the foci of the earth’s elliptical orbit, and not at its centre, is responsible for the changing of the seasons. In the absence of such factors the earth would have been less useful to man.
70:41-44
In this world when there is the example of an inferior thing being improved upon, the occurrence of similar other events is quite within the realm of the possible. Those who, in spite of such clear signs, do not learn any lessons are undoubtedly frivolous people. Such people learn lessons only when they are compelled to do so.
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