Then the world of the earth appeared. On that journey of the imagination, the dark, hypothetical rules of the philosophy which does not obey religion depicted a ghastly world. Voyaging through space on the ship of the aged earth —which travels seventy times faster than a cannon-ball a distance of twenty-five thousand years in one year, ever disposed to break up, its interior in a state of upheaval— the situation of wretched human kind appeared to me in a desolate darkness. My eyes darkened. I flung the spectacles of philosophy to the ground, smashing them. Then I looked with a view illumined with the wisdom of the Qur’an and belief, and I saw the Names of Creator of the Heavens and Earth, All-Powerful, All-Knowing, Sustainer, Allah, Sustainer of the Heavens and Earth, Subjugator of the Sun and Moon had risen like suns in the signs of mercy, grandeur, and dominicality. They lit up that dark, desolate, and terrifying world so that the globe appeared to my eye of belief as a well-ordered, subjugated, pleasant, and safe ship, or aeroplane, or train. It contained everyone’s provisions, and had been decked out for trade and enjoyment and to carry beings with spirits through the dominical realms around the sun. I exclaimed: “All praise be to God to the number of particles of the earth for the bounty of belief.”

This has been proved with many comparisons in the Risale-i Nur, that those who follow vice and misguidance suffer a hellish torment in this world too, while through the manifestations of belief, the believers and righteous may taste through the stomachs of Islam and humanity the pleasures of Paradise. They may benefit according to the degree of their belief. But in these stormy times, currents which numb the senses and scatter man’s attention on peripheral matters, plunging him into them, have deadened his senses and bewildered him. As a result of this the people of misguidance are temporarily unable to feel their torment, while the people of guidance are overwhelmed by heedlessness and cannot truly appreciate its pleasures.

The Second Awesome Condition This Age: In former times, compared with the present there was very little absolute disbelief, or misguidance arising from science, or the disbelief arising from perverse obstinacy. The instruction of the Islamic scholars of those times and their arguments were therefore sufficient, quickly dispelling any unbelief arising from doubts. Belief in God was general, and they could persuade most people to give up their