Dajjal and the destiny of Jerusalem

 

Dajjal (Anti-Christ), the Qur’an and the Beginning of History

Dajjal and the destiny of Jerusalem

Let us now return to Israel and the Balfour Declaration before we conclude. It would not be justified to conclude this essay without including Dajjal and his role towards the end of history. This verse of Surah al-Maidah is certainly linked strongly to Dajjal’s role in impersonating the Messiah when he comes into our dimension of existence, primarily because of what we have witnessed of events unfolding in the last hundred years. 

 

In order for Dajjal to successfully deceive the world into believing in him as the Messiah who would, according to scriptural basis, rule the world from the throne of Nabi Daud ʿalayhi as-salām in Jerusalem, he would have to do a number of things:

 

1. Liberate the Holy Land from Muslim rule.

2. Establish the state and consequently kingdom of Israel.

3. Raise that power to the ruling state in the world. 

4. Then appear and sit on the throne and declare that he is the prophesied Messiah and that the throne of David has returned. 

 

Now, it is impossible for anyone to deny that it was precisely this Judeo-Christian alliance that we have discussed so far, that has successfully fulfilled numbers one and two above. If Dajjal is to come and declare himself the Messiah, that cannot happen unless number three too comes to pass. It therefore only remains for us to witness Israel taking over from the United States of America as the ruling state in the world. Whether India or China becomes the ruling the state in the world as it has been of much debate, cannot be the concern of those who study the modern world using the Qur’an. It is Israel that we would have to pay particular attention to. 

 

More than two thousand years after Allah, Most Majestic is He, expelled the Jews from the Holy Land for the crime they committed against His Messenger, Nabi ‘Isa ʿalayhi as-salām, they returned to the Holy Land gradually over a matter of about three decades to reclaim it as their own. This occurred between the Balfour Declaration in 1917 and the establishment of the State of Israel in 1947. The reference to this has been mentioned in the Qur’an in the 91st and 92nd verses of Surah al-Anbiyah, where Allah laid down clearly that it would be the function of Gog and Magog to cause the Jews to return to the Holy Land. From the testimony of history, what we witnessed in the world from 1917–47, it is clear that those who facilitated the return of the Jews to the Holy Land were precisely those very same Jews and Christians who allied amongst themselves in the very beginning effort of the First Crusades. Though they were not successful then, they eventually became successful in 1947. It should therefore be established from the clear and distinct link between the two verses (95 and 96) of Surah al-Anbiyah and the 51st verse of Surah al-Maidah that Gog Magog is located in the very Judeo-Christian alliance that  would cause the return of the Jews to the Holy Land and who would, as we witness clearly unfolding now before our very eyes—for those who have eyes to read the modern world using the Qur’an—raise that state of Israel to become the ruling state in the world for Dajjal to finally appear in our dimension of existence and declare himself the King of the Jews, the Promised Messiah.  

 

If we fail to grasp the meaning behind the 51st verse of Surah al-Maidah to be the very description of Gog and Magog, then we will remain blind to Allah’s warning in the Qur’an not to take them, this particular Judeo-Christian alliance, or in other words Gog and Magog as our Awliya. We will never understand who Gog and Magog are and we will never understand that after all that have already unfolded in the political world today, what remains is only Israel’s rise to become the ruling state in the world. We will never understand that it is this Judeo-Christian alliance, in whose ranks will be Dajjal’s foot soldiers.     

 

Conclusion 

The problem with modern Islamic scholarship generally is that anything new that comes out from a credible scholar is rejected on the grounds that scholars of the past did not hold such views. This is what may be called religious conservatism. Secondly, anything new that comes out from a credible scholar is rejected on the grounds that it contradicts the scholars of the past, while it actually may not. Why should it not be taken as something that adds on new knowledge to the scholarship of  the past? 

 

The essential question now is: Are we going to understand and attempt to explain the modern world using the Qur’an or remain in the dark of what has happened in history and what is to unfold tomorrow because of our holding on obdurately to what the noble scholars of Islam had written down in the past, without allowing ourselves any room to think things through? Consequently, we should also ask: Does the Qur’an prohibit us from doing that? 

 

We cannot afford to reserve knowledge of Allah’s Book, Most Wise is He, to the noble scholars of the past. They could not have seen what would unfold in the years 1917–47 for example, simply because it did not happen in their time. Prof. Hamka saw what happened in his time and gave new meaning to the verse of Surah al-Maidah according to what he saw. He did not put a full stop to the meanings of the verse there. Similarly Maulana Hosein has explained the same verse in a better light now about four decades after Prof. Hamka, quite simply because he was able to read all the world events that occurred thereafter using the Qur’an.  

 

Let us now read Maulana Hosein’s translation of the verse again after having gone through all of the analysis above that has led us to where we are now: 

O you who have faith, do not take (such) Jews and (such) Christians as your Awliya (friends and allies) who (themselves) are Awliya (friends and allies) of each other. And whoever amongst you turn to them for friendship and alliance, would belong to them (and therefore not to us). Surely Allah does not provide guidance to a people who commit Dhulm. 

 

This therefore is a modern attempt to translate the verse in as coherent as possible a manner to all the other verses mentioned above in our analysis that it would otherwise clearly contradict. This translation explains our times; it explains Akhir al-Zaman. It is further an attempt to be as coherent as possible to the trails of history. It is also a credible attempt of a scholar of integrity and age who found it necessary to add on to the meanings of the verse that the noble scholars of the past had explained and interpreted. Lastly it must be noted that the Maulana’s intention, as some would wrongly have it so, is not to contradict the scholarship of the past. This does not contradict previous explanations provided by the noble scholars of the past; it does not nullify all other explanations of the verse that have been given before. It has rather added on to them.  

 

Maulana Hosein’s interpretation of the verse broadens what is being misinterpreted as a moral alliance—in itself ambiguous—to political, economic and military dimensions; it also explains the times we are living in and clarifies the prohibition in our times violating which has caused in the Muslim world all the innumerable consequences of taking part in the Dzulm (wrongdoing, oppression and injustice) of the oppressor. Saudi Arabia’s, Morocco’s and Turkey’s alliance with NATO are clear examples of this. This is clearly not a contradiction of the scholarly work of the past but an expansion of the meanings of the Qur’an, most importantly from an eschatological perspective.

 

Lastly, when we bring to mind the meaning of Barakah in the Qur’an, that the Qur’an explains all times and that the Qur’an offers new and fresh knowledge in every age, we would not look at Maulana Hosein’s explanation of the verse as something which contradicts the previous classical commentaries to the Qur’an. We would only look at it with gratitude that a Muslim scholar, ripe of age, knowledge and experience, has added on fresh knowledge to the meanings of Allah’s Kalam.  

 

It now suffices to conclude that modern global events that occurred in the last hundred years have demanded this interpretation to come out from the Qur’an and it had to be Maulana Hosein whom Allah, Most High, had chosen to bring this forward to those who would now turn to the Qur’an to understand the ominous events unfolding in our world before our eyes, especially in the Holy Land. This has only given a new direction and meaning to the application of this verse in these times, especially now that we are living in an important phase of Akhir al-Zaman.

 

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What is the Ruh (spirit)?

  

Dajjal (Anti-Christ), the Qur’an and the Beginning of History

What is the Ruh?

 

When the Qur’an described the event of the creation of the human being, it located that event in the spiritual realm, before human beings were excluded from al-Jannah, i.e., heaven, and sent down to the material universe. Even so, it declared of that event that man was created from ‘humble clay’:

(Qur’an, al-An’am, 6:2)

He it is who has created man out of clay, and then has decreed a term for him—a term known only to Him Most High.  And yet people doubt. 

 

(Qur’an, al-Hijr, 15:28)

Allah Most High declared to the angels that He was about to create mortal man out of potter’s clay, out of dark mud molded into shape. 

 

The only way that mankind could have been created of ‘clay’ in a spiritual realm, prior to being transformed to material form in this world of space and time, is if that ‘clay’ was, itself, spiritual in nature and form, i.e., ‘clay’ which existed as spiritual substance, and which had not as yet been transformed to material form. Can there be such a thing as ‘spiritual’ clay?

 

When the Qur’an declared of Allah Most High that He is the Nur (light) of the Samawat (or the parallel universes, i. e., the seven worlds of space and time that exist beyond our materiel universe) and the earth (or the material universe), (alNur, 24:35) the implication is that all of creation is ultimately resolvable or reducible to Nur, i.e., light, and that all of creation must have emerged from Nur. Hence, at the level of spiritual substance all things must exist as Nur or ‘light’. It is that ‘light’ which is, perhaps, heated up to become ‘smokeless fire’, from which the Jinn were created, and then cooled down to be transformed to ‘material clay’, in which form human beings emerged in this material universe. (For a better explanation of this complex subject see Dr. Muhammad Fazlur Rahman Ansari’s two books entitled ‘Foundations of Faith’ and ‘Quranic Foundations and Structure of Muslim Society’. World Federation of Islamic Missions, Karachi.) 

 

We may conclude from the above that all human beings existed in the form of spiritual clay before emerging in the form of material clay in the material universe. Hence all human beings existed in the spiritual realm with a spiritual body prior to emerging in this material universe with a material body. We may recall, in support of the above, that the Qur’an has declared that all human beings—including those who have not as yet been born in the material universe—were created at the dawn of creation (i.e., in the spiritual realm) and endowed with the means with which to ‘see’, to ‘hear’ and to ‘understand’:

 

(Qur’an, al-An’am, 7:172)

And mankind must know that when their Lord-God brought forth from the progeny of Adam, at the dawn of creation, their offspring, generation after generation until the last, and caused them to bear witness to their divinely-ordained status, He asked them: Am I not your Lord-God? They replied: Yea, indeed, we do bear witness thereto! Allah has reminded us about this event lest some people complain on the Day of Resurrection that they were unaware of this.

 

We may now also recall to advantage an incident which occurred in the Battle of Uhud when the companions saw the Prophet ṣallā -llāhu taʿālā ʿalayhī wa-sallam looking up in the sky while uttering the words ”Subhan Allah” (i.e., glory be to Allah)! A companion of his, Sayyiduna Hanzalah bin Abi `Amir Rahib, was killed in the fighting while he was still in a state of Janaba (the state of ritual impurity that exists after sexual intercourse, and which requires a Ghusl or bath to be taken in order for a state of ritual purity to be restored), and the Prophet observed the Angels in the sky giving Ghusl, i.e., a bath, to the body of that companion. 

 

While the material dead body with its distinctive shape and form, was lying on the battlefield, a spiritual body of identical shape and form as the material body, was observed in the sky, and that is why it could be recognized as the Companion who had just been killed. Both bodies were created from the same original clay; but the body in the sky appeared in clay in its spiritual form, while the body lying on the battlefield was comprised of clay in its material form. 

 

The supra-rational bond which connected the spiritual body with the material body was such that when some Companions who had heard the comment of the Prophet, went to examine Hanzala’s material body on the battle-field, they found drops of water on the body. (See Kitab al-Maghazi by alWaqidi; edited by Rizwi Faizar, translated to English by Rizwi Faizer, Amal Ismail and Abdul Kader Tayob, and published in Routledge Studies in Classical Islam, Routledge. Oxford. 2011. p. 134).

 

There is a similar incident which revealed to us that the spiritual body of Uwais al-Qarni lingered on in Yathrib (renamed Madina despite the fact that the Qur’an refers to it as Yathrib), even after his material body had left Yathrib on a sorrowful return to his native Yemen. He had travelled all the way from Yemen to Yathrib just to see the Prophet ṣallā -llāhu taʿālā ʿalayhī wa-sallam, but when he arrived in Yathrib he learnt to his sorrow that the Prophet had travelled out of the city. Since he could not stay in Yathrib long enough to await his return, he had to leave without seeing the Prophet. Shortly after Uwais’s departure the Prophet returned to Yathrib and experienced a heavenly fragrance. When he subsequently learnt about the visitor from Yemen, the Prophet identified that fragrance to belong to Uwais. The fragrance came from Uwais’s spiritual body, even though his material body had already departed.  

 

Visions also provide data which assist us to understand how the spiritual can be connected to the material. I once delivered a lecture many years ago on the subject of ‘Dreams and Visions in Islam’ at the Pertapis Hall in Singapore (prior to the Government of Singapore banning my entry into that country), and when the program was over, a young man approached me to confide in me the following vision which he had experienced.  He said that he was asleep in Yathrib, the city of the blessed Prophet ṣallā -llāhu taʿālā ʿalayhī wa-sallam when he saw the Prophet entering his room. There was a heavenly fragrance which enveloped the room while the Prophet remained in the room in which he was sleeping. The young man then confided in me that when he woke up from his sleep, that wonderful fragrance still lingered in the room for some time. 

 

We have provided sufficient evidence above to confirm both the creation of a spiritual human body prior to its emergence in material form in this world of space and time, and of the existence of a supra-rational connection between the spiritual human body and the material body.  

 

Having created man from spiritual clay, the Qur’an provided further information concerning the process through which he developed into a sentient and rational being. The Qur’an declared that Allah Most High then proceeded to fashion him and, astonishingly so, to breathe into him of His own Ruh or Divine spirit:

(Qur’an, al-Hijr, 15:28–29)

Allah Most High declared to the angels that He was about to create mortal man out of potter’s clay, out of dark mud molded into shape; Then, when Allah Most High formed him fully, He breathed into him of His Ruh, i.e., Divine Spirit .  .  . 

 

The Ruh, or Divine Spirit, is not a created thing. It is not a ‘thing’ that exists apart from Allah Most High, even though it belongs to Him and it proceeds from Him. While the Ruh can be breathed into a ‘thing’, but it is not a ‘thing’. Rather it is with Ruh that ‘life’ is activated, and when Ruh is withdrawn, death occurs. It is necessary for us to offer this explanation in order to prevent any pantheistic interpretation to be attributed to the breathing of the Divine Ruh into the human being. Allah Almighty says in the Qur’an that to Him belongs al-Khalq, i.e. the created world, and al-Amr, i.e., the world of command through which events occur:

(Qur’an, al-‘Araf, 7:54) 

 Verily, to Allah belongs all creation, i.e., the world of creation, and all command, i.e., a world of command which does not belong to the created world. Hallowed is Allah, the Lord-God of all the worlds! 

 

And He then went on to explain that the Ruh belongs to the world of Amr (and hence, does not belong to the world of Khalq):

(Qur’an, al-Isra’, 17:85)

When the Jews question you Oh Muhammad, about the Ruh. Say to them that the Ruh is from Allah’s Command; 

 

Unlike the Nafs, i.e., the human ‘self’, and the physical human body, which both belong to the world of Khalq or creation, the Ruh does not belong to that world of ‘creation’, rather it belongs to the world of Amr or command. 

 

The world of created things emerges through a divine command— ‘Be!’: 

(Qur’an, Yasin, 36:82)

Allah’s Command is such that when He wills a thing to be, He but says unto it, Be! —and it is. 

 

(Qur’an, al-Baqarah, 2:117)

He is the Originator of the heavens and the earth: and when He Wills a thing to be, He but says unto it, Be! —and it is. 

 

Similarly the Ruh manifests itself in a human being through the Divine command: The Ruh is from Allah’s Command (see 17:85 above). 

 

The human Ruh proceeds therefore from the Divine Amr through which creation takes place. Hence the human Ruh partakes in the Divine capacity to create, and this explains why the Qur’an recognizes Allah Most High as the best of those who create:

(Qur’an, al-Mu’minun, 23:14)

Hallowed, therefore, is Allah, the best of those who create!  

 

Since the Divine Ruh was breathed into man, the implication is that he now possessed creative capacity in a creative faculty of rational thought potentially enriched (because of the Ruh) by intuitive internal spiritual insight:

(Qur’an, al-Sajda, 32:9) 

And then Allah formed him in accordance with what he is meant to be, and breathed into him of His Divine spirit: and thus, O men, did He endow you with hearing, and sight, and hearts as well as minds through which you can acquire knowledge, yet how seldom are you grateful! 

 

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