WAYS OF SELF-CORRECTION

WAYS OF SELF-CORRECTION Fear of Accountability In the name of God, the Most Gracious, the Most Merciful When the earth is shaken with its violent shaking, when the earth shakes off her burdens, when man asks, ‘What is happening to her?’; on that Day it will narrate its account, for your Lord has so directed it. On that Day people will come forward in separate groups to be shown their deeds: whoever has done the smallest bit of good will see it; while whoever has done the smallest particle of evil will see it. (99: 1-8) T HESE are the verses of Chapter Al-Zalzalah (The Earthquake) of the Quran. The earthquake on Doomsday will be the announcement of the end of the testing period for man. This would mean that the freedom which was theirs on account of their being on trial, has now been snatched away from them. Now the time has come when human beings will be recompensed for their deeds. Today, God’s world is silent, but when conditions change, everything found here will start talking. The inventions of the present day have proved that lifeless or inanimate things also have the capacity to ‘talk.’ A performance in a studio is fully reproduced by a video film and records. Similarly, the present world is, so to say, a big ‘studio’ of God. Whatever a man does or says or even thinks, everything is being recorded at every moment. And when the time comes, this world will repeat everybody’s story in such a way that not a thing, great or small, will be left out. There is a story relating to this chapter in which there is a great lesson. It is said that once a man came to the Prophet and after some discussion, he accepted the Prophet’s faith. Then the Prophet said to him: “Stay with Ali ibn Abu Talib [one of the Prophet’s Companions] for your further training.” A few days later, the Prophet asked Ali ibn Abu Talib about the man who had come to him. He replied that he had stayed with him for a while and then he had gone away, and that now he had no knowledge of his whereabouts. Whatever a man does or says or even thinks, is being recorded at every moment. And when the time comes, this world will repeat everybody’s story in such a way that not a thing, great or small, will be left out.