Page 180 - Darwin's Dilemma: The Soul

Darwin’s Dilemma: The Soul

Just as the troubles, difficulties and woes in our dreams lose
all significance when we awaken, the events, sorrows and troub-
les of this shadow world are similarly trivial. The life of this world
is simply a part of the test created for us, and our responsibility is
to demonstrate the moral virtues and good manners most pleasing
to Allah in the face of these. In the Hereafter, the imaginary images
created within this test will lose their meanings and importance.
What remains will be the good works performed in order to obtain
Allah’s approval. Whether or not a person realizes this now, when
the life of the Hereafter begins, he will certainly understand that
everything in the world consists of an illusion and that the reality
is our Lord and the Hereafter created by Him.
This is revealed in a verse:

The life of this world is nothing but a game and a diver-
sion. The abode of the Hereafter—that is truly Life, if they
only knew. (Surat al-‘Ankabut, 64)
When one watches a television screen, one is aware that all the
characters in it are entirely fictitious. There is no need to feel anger
at what they do or sorrow at what happens to them. In the same
way, one should not fall into a similar error in the life of this world.
That is because, just like a television program, the life of this world
consists of images laid out constantly before us. In the same way
that someone who is dreaming becomes angry or is saddened by
what befalls him in that dream, but realizes when he wakes that all
this was completely illusory, the same applies to the life of this
world. Sooner or later, either in this world or in the Hereafter, one
will realize that one never has direct contact with the outside
world, and that all one’s worries are completely meaningless.
These images are created solely as a test. What matters is to
realize that they are indeed fictitious and to behave in a manner
compatible with Allah’s approval and to live for that purpose.
Allah has revealed in His verses that this world, con-

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