5:98
“Know that Allah is severe in penalty and that Allah is Forgiving and
Merciful.”
This verse alone summarizes the reward and punishment system in Quran. That is God is severe in bringing harsh consequences
to his enemies and to infidels while he is especially kind and generous to believers at the same time. There are
numerous verses of Quran which verify this claim. For the faithful rewards would
range from vivid and detailed descriptions of heaven to the ultimate elevation
of joining God himself as stated in 89:27-30:
[To the righteous it will be said], "O reassured soul,
Return to your Lord, well-pleased and pleasing [to Him],
In contrast, when it comes to
infidels those who enter into war against God or those who keep denying all
God’s sings and his messengers carelessly are warned of dire consequences. Namely, in battlefront and only in
battlefront Quran invites the believers to fight back fiercely until they stop
combat.
“ So when you meet those who
disbelieve [in battle], strike [their] necks until, when you have inflicted
slaughter upon them, then secure their bonds, and either [confer] favor
afterwards or ransom [them] until the war lays down its burdens. That [is the
command]. And if Allah had willed, He could have taken vengeance upon them
[Himself], but [He ordered armed struggle] to test some of you by means of
others. And those who are killed in the cause of Allah - never will He waste
their deeds.”
8:37
“Fight in the way of
Allah those who fight you but do not transgress. Indeed. Allah does not like
transgressors.”
There are also many verses in which
God describes the hell-fire in details and depicts the excruciating pain and punishments that
await his enemies after life.
In order to understand this, we have to start with the necessity of a
reward and punishment systems. If creation
and if life is purposeful, which is as stated in the following verse, then life has to have a worthwhile gain for everyone who is going through this journey.
"He created the heavens
and earth in truth. High is He above what they associate with Him."
Life is only meaningful and worth living if we consider it a learning
experience as a whole. In truth, all the pain and joy of life leave us with nothing
but a spiritual perception that would either enrich our understanding of life
or denies the lesson we were supposed to learn from the situation. We can all imagine a scenario, for example,
in which a child never leaves his mom going to a pre-school because it is a
very unpleasant for the child for a while until he or she get used to the new learning environment. In the same way, we may have seen how bizarre it is if an adult
person would take a dull toy as serious as a child. He might be considered retarded which means not intellectually grown to the age. To a good extent, these two cases represent the essence of the whole
life, we are supposed to move on from one stage of learning to another in a way
that looks painful and unpleasant to give us our earned gains for more precious ones in the next stage.
I have to emphasize the fact that although the life experiences we all go through is more or less the same for
everyone, our personal perceptions from the same events are not. That
is actually the main reason ,in my view, we end up with different beliefs and accordingly
different actions which lead us to far apart personalities. In short, the higher the rewards of an
educational system, the higher the motivation for the learners to endure the
hard work. That is perhaps why God says "I have created man in hardship."
90:4
“We have certainly
created man into hardship.”
It has been clearly
stated in Quran in different occasions that it is very challenging for human
to overcome its natural desires and go beyond a physical world while apparently
he is not equipped with more than material means. That is to say, seeing the unseen by the eyes
that we apparently lack and believing in a cause for the whole cosmos and only in the one who does not have any cause himself unlike all human’s experiences in the material world. This is evidently unlikely for humans as testified by the angels whom were informed by God of his intention to create man. We can therefore, say such challenge does
deserve rewards and considering the hardship it is fair to expect substantial
gains out of this life.
Now that we have established with the necessity of lucrative rewards for the good learners in the school of life, we are faced with two
choices for the non-learner who deny the light of learning and fight with it with all their means, who destroy the schools and kill the teachers and so on. (not those who are not capable of learning and especial needs are well respected by God). The first option is to be lenient in consequences and overlooking their harmful actions hoping that it
will make the wrongdoers come back and undergo the unpleasant change growing toward light.
Considering the nature of
humans on one hand and the deceptive superficial joy embedded in worldly
gains on the other hand, it would ,most likely, incline all pupils to incline toward the short term benefits rather than long term
rewards.
One can argue that this is
already the way life looks like to most people. While this view my be corroborated by Quran too, I believe, if the rewards and punishments
are not designed equally, it will be just and will be conflicting with the freedom of choice as we would be influenced toward one or the other. I believe, God has explicitly
clarified the consequences of our actions and has let us decided on our fate freely, which is the only way that such rewards would make sense.
What is most interesting
about God’s system of punishment, nevertheless, is the door of repent which has
been repeatedly emphasized in Quran. That is the possibility of being saved
despite a sinful life and in spite of being a lifelong wicked person if we turn our heart to God. This is a unique opportunity available throughout our journey and it is exclusively found in God’s educational system.
If we would find the
above reasoning convincing for afterlife or for long term benefits in this life ,
we are left with skepticism over the way God deals with his adversaries in battlefronts when
they have started a war. While it is true that the concerning verses sound
unforgiving, we have to realize that, in reality, no nice word or act of
kindness can change the determination of an evil worrier who is fighting for the immediate
material gains of the world. It is only
when they feel dominated they get a chance to listen to their heart.
Not too long ago, the world witnessed the Second
World War which led to the loss of life of 50-60 million people and destruction
of most of the civilized world at the time. I believe, it was ended because the initiators
of war felt defeated and felt inferior, otherwise it would have continued for
much longer time. In other words, what
made them change their mind clearly was the harsh confrontation of other
nations including the rightful conventional combats and the wrongful use of nuclear weapons
over Japan.
2:251
“So they defeated them by
permission of Allah , and David killed Goliath, and Allah gave him the kingship
and prophethood and taught him from that which He willed. And if it were
not for Allah defeating [some] people by means of others, the earth would have
been corrupted, but Allah is full of bounty to the worlds.”
صدق الله العلي العظيم
Quran quotes from www.Quran.com
