THE QUEST FOR IDEAL SOCIETY

ideology that is against the creation plan of the Creator can produce any positive result. The Creation Plan of God The Quran, being a preserved book, is a reliable source to know God’s creation plan. A study of the Quran informs us that the plan according to which God created human beings is not based on any assumed social system. It is based entirely on the notion of individual reform. In order to put into effect His scheme in the world, the Creator sent prophets in every age to instruct man. The target of the call of all the prophets was always the individual, and not any sort of socio-political system. According to God’s creation plan, the establishment of an ideal social system at the collective level in the world is of no real concern. The Creator’s target is the individual―the preparation and selection of the individuals, not the establishment of any ideal society. It is simply not possible for an ideal collective system to be established in this world. An ideal system or ideal society can be established only in Paradise. The status of the present world is of a selection ground. God’s will is that, in the present world, such righteous individuals be selected who would be deserving of being settled in the eternal Paradise of the Hereafter. To further understand this matter, we should study Chapter 2 (The Heifer) of the Quran. The relevant verses from the Quran (2: 30-31) tell us: When your Lord said to the angels, “I am putting a successor on earth,” they said, “Will You place someone there who will cause corruption on it and shed blood, while we glorify You with Your praise and extol Your holiness?” [God] answered, “Surely, I know that which you do not know.” He taught Adam all the names, then He set them before the angels and said, “Tell Me the names of these, if what you say be true.” When God created man as a free creature and decided to place the earth in his charge, the angels expressed the apprehension that with the free will, man would create strife and corruption on earth and would shed blood. This apprehension of the angels was not unfounded. The Quran itself verifies that this is indeed what happened. In the first quarter of the seventh century CE, when the Quran was revealed, God included this verse in it: Corruption has appeared on land and sea because of the evil which men’s hands have done. (30: 41) Here, the question arises that when the phenomenon whose apprehension the angels had expressed actually occurred, why did