THE SIGNS OF DOOMSDAY

THE SIGNS OF DOOMSDAY Be Ready before It’s Too Late A NUMBER of Hadith narrations informs us that as Doomsday approaches, many signs will appear. The report of the climate change shows that all the signs have already appeared. These signs are multifarious, but we shall describe only a few of them here. 1. According to a Hadith, “When the Doomsday approaches, the sun will come closer to man.” (Musnad Ahmad) As a result of this, great heat will be generated on earth. This Hadith tells us exactly what we have been told through science. The sun coming closer does not mean that the distance of the sun and the earth will become less, for in such a case life on earth would immediately come to an end. This coming closer, in fact, is symbolic of the heat of the sun becoming more intense, thereby raising the temperature. 2. What will happen to man when the sun’s heat increases? This has been expressed thus in the Hadith: “The people will be sweating. Some will sweat till their ankles; some till their knees, others till their waist and yet others till their faces. (Mishkat al Masabih) The Arabic word araq in this Hadith, which is used to mean sweat, literally means ‘squeezed water’. Sweat is called araq because it squeezes [or oozes] out of the human body. This Hadith, in fact, symbolically tells us that during the Last Days, when the sun’s heat will increase and the glaciers of ice and the ice sheets at the polar caps of the Arctic and Antarctica will start melting, then the sea level will rise. As a result, the coastal settlements will be submerged in sea water. Some areas will be totally submerged, while others will be less affected, depending upon the altitude of the land mass affected. According to an ongoing temperature analysis led by scientists at NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies (GISS), the average global temperature on Earth has increased by at least 1.1° Celsius since 1880. 3. Similarly according to a Hadith, ‘Smoke will rise before Doomsday which will fill the east and the west.’ (Al-Qurtubi) This Hadith clearly refers to the modern phenomenon of smog produced by air pollution. This kind of air pollution did not exist in ancient times. No one could even conceive of such a thing. This Hadith surely is a prediction of this modern phenomenon which is a product of industrial activity. The burning of fossil fuels, emissions from transport, and the environmental impact of intensive farming have all contributed to high