Al-Risala (English), May-June 2000

In the next life he will enjoy the sumptuous fruits of his own planting. People adopt a rebellious stance in this world; yet continue to imagine that they will be raised up amongst God’s obedient servants. They are willfully destructive, but still think that, in eternity, they will have a share in the fruits of constructiveness. Their lives are based on mere words and they believe that these words will take the form of reality in the hereafter. They hear the message of God and refuse to accept it; even so, they have the presumption to think that God will be pleased with them. God beckons man towards paradise, the abode of eternal comfort and bliss, but man is lost in transitory and illusory pleasures. He does not heed the call of God. He thinks he is gaining while, in fact, he is losing. He believes that the worldly constructions which he is busy erecting will serve him well in the future, but he is only building walls of sand, which will fall never to rise again. □ The Inhabitants of Paradise P aradise is for those, and those alone, who reject all material forms of greatness in order to assert the majesty of Almighty God; who empty their hearts of every other affection and enshrine God therein. Paradise is for the just, not the cruel, the humble, not the haughty. He who mistreats and degrades others, even when he has grounds for complaint against them forfeits the right to enter Paradise. Plotting to destroy others with whom one is on bad terms and taking delight only in one’s own honour and