THE CREATION PLAN OF GOD — Discover Meaning

THE CREATION PLAN OF GOD Discover Meaning T HE famous historian, Edward Gibbon, observed: “Human history is little more than a register of the crimes, follies and misfortunes of mankind.” Other historians have also arrived at similar conclusions, for the ideal existence envisioned by philosophers is nowhere reflected in human societies. Orientalists’ who have made an in-depth study of human history have remarked that, with regards to human failure to achieve the ideal society, Islamic history is no great exception. Orientalists’ hold that, although the history of the first phase of Islam — known as the golden age — no doubt presents a better picture than that of other periods, it too fails to measure up to the ideal. During the life of the Prophet, owing to the antagonistic activities of the hypocrites internally and the Jews and unbelievers externally, Madinah, the city of the Prophet, could never in any significant sense be converted into an area of peace. After the Prophet’s demise, and shortly after the first Caliph, Abu Bakr, had been appointed to be the leader of the Muslims, most of the Arab tribes revolted. The ideal existence envisioned by philosophers is nowhere reflected in human societies. Subsequently, in almost every period, unfavourable developments repeatedly proved to be hindrances to the formation of the ideal society. During the times of Umar, the second Caliph, a secret lobby in Madinah, working towards the extirpation of Islam, finally succeeded in having the Caliph assassinated. Afterwards, the age of open opposition set in. The third Caliph, likewise, was publicly murdered. The reign of Ali, the fourth Caliph, was marked by civil war in which thousands of precious lives were lost and the Caliph himself was martyred. Given the state of affairs, thinkers and philosophers have always expressed pessimistic views about human history, holding it to be an ongoing tragedy: events have shown that, in this world, the building of the ideal human society is well-nigh impossible. The reason for this pessimistic view of history does not lie in history itself, but in our flawed approach to the subject. Our criterion to study