PARADISE: A UNIVERSAL CONCEPT

they go on holidays. But when they return from the holiday, they find they have another problem―holiday stress. They squander their wealth acquiring commodities, but indulgence in their possessions only deprives them of higher thinking. They spend their money on love-affairs which only has the opposite effect of creating hatred. Eventually, such people remain disillusioned and deprived of the joys of family life. Even if we suppose that one such person saves himself from all the negative consequences of this concept, it is inevitable that before reaching the age of a hundred, he grows old and weak, and is confined to his bed. Then with no option left, he must get admission to a hospital and leaving everything behind, depart from this world one day. One such example appeared in the news reports of January 12, 2008. Sir Edmund Hillary, a New Zealand mountaineer, was a very strong person. He was the first climber to reach the peak of Mount Everest. When he set foot on the summit of the highest mountain of the world, news of his achievement broke in headlines in the newspapers. He was called the ‘conqueror of Everest’. Setting foot on top of Everest he exclaimed with pride, “To my great delight, I realized we were on top of Mount Everest and the whole world spread out below us.” (Times of India, January 12, 2008) But when he died at the age of eighty-eight on January 11, 2008, he was lying on a hospital bed, weak and infirm. He was left with no option but to accept the verdict of death and leave all his possessions and all his desires to enter a world for which it appeared he had nothing with him. Quranic Model Now, let us take the Quranic model of Paradise. The Quranic model is based on the creation plan of God. According to the Quran, the creation plan of God and Paradise are associated with one another. Hence, to understand Paradise as explained in the Quran, it is necessary to do so in the light of the creation plan of the Creator of the universe. The Quran is the book of God. It has been fully preserved in its original form. According to the Quran, God created human beings and settled The present world is like a selection ground. Here man is placed under various circumstances to be judged according to his deeds to determine if he would qualify for the ideal world of Paradise.