Glory be to Him Whom has subjected these to us, for we could never have accomplished this,(43:13)

which it is Sunna to recite when mounting such means of transport as horses or ships.[2]

I saw that with its motion the globe of the earth had assumed the position of a projector showing images as in the cinema; it brought into movement all the heavens and began to mobilize all the stars like a magnificent army. It shows such lofty scenes that it intoxicates those who think and fills them with wonder. “Glory be to God!”, I exclaimed,   “what  numerous,  vast,  strange,  wonderful,  and  elevated   works  are performed at so little expense!” Two subtle points concerning belief occurred to me after this:

The First: A few days ago I was asked a question by a guest: the gist of it, which inferred doubt, was this: Paradise and Hell are a great distance away. Through divine grace, the people of Paradise will pass through the resurrection like lightning or as swiftly as Buraq, and enter Paradise. But the people of Hell, how will they go, with their ponderous bodies, loaded down with the heavy burdens of their sins?  How will they travel?

What occurred to me was this: if for example all nations are invited to a general congress in America and each boards a huge boat and goes there, in the same way, the globe, which travels the long distance of twenty-five thousand years in one year in the vast  ocean  of  the  universe,  will  take  on  its  people,  travel  to  the  field  of  the resurrection, and disembark them. Furthermore, the Hell at the centre of the earth is indicated by the fact that the earth’s temperature increases one degree every thirty- three metres. That Hell will pour its fire into the Greater Hell, whose temperature of two hundred thousand degrees is similar to that described in Hadith and according to Hadiths will carry out some of the duties of the Greater Hell in this world and the Intermediate Realm.[3] Then at a divine command, the earth will be transformed into a better, eternal form, and will become one of the habitations of the hereafter.

The Second Point which comes to mind: it is the custom of the All-Powerful Maker, the All-Wise Creator, the Single One of Unity, in order to demonstrate the perfection of His power and beauty of His wisdom and proofs of His unit y, to perform many works with very little and to have large duties carried out by small things. As I have said in some of the Words, if all things are attributed  to a single being, they become so easy as to be necessary. Whereas if they are attributed to numerous makers and causes, as many difficulties arise as to make them impossible. For a single person  like  an  officer  or  master  builder  easily  positions  numerous  soldiers  or numerous stones with a single act, a single movement, and obtains a result. But if, in order to obtain those positions and results, it is referred to the soldiers in the army or the stones of the dome, which is without support, they could be achieved only with truly numerous acts, numerous difficulties, and great confusion.

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            [2] Muslim, Hajj, 425; Abu Da’ud, Jihad, 72, 74; Tirmidhi, Da’wat, 46.

[3] See, Bukhari, Bad’ al-Khalq, 10; Muslim, Janna, 30; Tirmidhi, Jahannam, 7; Musnad, ii, 313.