The Creation Plan of God

circumstances in order that desirable people will go on being produced for such a selection. The Qur’an states: Do men think that once they say: ‘We are believers,’ they will be left alone and not be tried? We tested those who have gone before them. God knows those who are truthful and those who are lying (29:1-3). In a similar vein the Qur’an says: Did you suppose that you would go to Paradise untouched by the suffering which was endured by those before you? Affliction and adversity befell them; and so battered were they that each apostle, and those who shared his faith, cried out: ‘When will the help of God come?’ His help is ever near (2:214). There is another verse to this effect: Did you suppose that you would enter Paradise before God has known the men who fought hard and the steadfast? (3:142). Yet again the Qur’an addresses Muslims in these words: Did you imagine that you would be abandoned before God has had time to know those of you who have fought valiantly and served none but Him and His Apostle and the faithful? God is cognizant of all your actions (9.14). The truth is that in this world what is desirable to God is not the Ideal Society but the Ideal man. And as we learn from the Qur’an, such an individual is