Without a doubt, was the Tsunami a form of Allah (The Most High) communicating to the world, His unmatched power. Many people are grappling on how to view the recent Tsunami from a religious perspective, even within the Muslim community. I'll share with you one view, which is a dominant view amongst the Muslim Scholars of today. The following article is written by a scholar I personally know of, so I can trust his words :)
Oh and by the way, if you are a non-Muslim and are about to read this, you might feel a bit weird because he is addressing religious Muslims here... Also, I dont necessarily agree with all of his views, but that's a very minor issue; I agree with mostly everything he says.
On a final note, you will notice he keeps referring back to his book, "Jerusalem in the Qur'an." If you are interested in reading this, you can ask me for it. Have fun :)
Samir
Ten Major Signs of the Last Day
HAS ONE JUST OCCURRED?
Shaykh Imran N. Hosein
(ihosein@tstt.net.tt)
· LAST DAY MEANS LAST AGE
The term ‘Last Day’ in Islam really stands for the ‘Last Age’, or the age which would culminate with the end of history -- when the true Messiah, Jesus, the son of Mary (not son of God), would return to rule the world from Jerusalem with justice and ‘eternal’ rule. It would be ‘eternal’ in the sense that history would end with that event. Life on earth beyond that event, and after Jesus (s) dies a human death and is buried next to Prophet Muhammad (s) in Madina, would not qualify as history. This would be so since the modern secular rope would have reached its predictable end in total godlessness and with such a consequent collapse of morals, and of moral consciousness, that people would forget their human status and “would engage in sexual intercourse in public like donkeys”. Already it is quite clear (particularly at the time of Trinidad Carnival) that we are quite close to the fulfillment of that prophecy made by Prophet Muhammad (peace and blessings of Allah be upon him and upon all other prophets). So much so, then, for the spurious claims of the one-eyed modern white western civilization and its colored ‘house slaves’ around the world, that mankind is witnessing unprecedented progress, that the present is the best of all ages, that the world keeps on growing better and better, and that modern white western civilization has rendered all previous civilizations, including Islam, moribund and obsolete.
Prophet Muhammad (s) prophesied many more signs of the Last Day other than public roadside ‘donkey sex’. Most of these signs are known as the ‘minor’ signs. Let us describe some of them (randomly selected) before we turn to the ten ‘major’ signs in which we venture to include the recent major underwater earthquake and resultant Tsunami in South East Asia.
· MINOR SIGNS
Prophet Muhammad (s) prophesied of the Last Age that:
q “People would follow a way of life other than mine and give guidance other than mine”. . . . “I fear for my people only the leaders who lead men astray”. . . . “Before the Last Hour there will be great liars, so beware of them”. . . . “When the most wicked member of a tribe becomes its ruler, and the most worthless member of a community becomes its leader, and a man is respected through fear of the evil he may do, and leadership is given to people who are unworthy of it, expect the Last Hour”, – all of these warnings have already been dramatically and ominously fulfilled in the world, as well as in the community of Muslims, even here in Trinidad!
q Women would arrange their hair to look like the hump of a camel, - and that has already occurred;
q Women would dress like men, - and we already see them today with trousers, jacket and, perhaps, a tie;
q Men would dress like women, - and already no one can tell that ‘she’ is really a man;
q Homosexuality (and lesbianism) would become commonplace, - and that is now happening before our very eyes; indeed those who hold fast to the divine prohibition of such sexual perversion are now demonized as a people who suffer from a disease called homophobia;
q Children born outside of marriage would become commonplace, - in fact marriage itself now seems destined to become obsolete;
q Fornication and adultery would become commonplace, - that, also, appears to have already been fulfilled in a modern world in which virginity and marital fidelity are becoming old-fashioned;
q Disproportion in balance of men and women to such an extent that one man would have to maintain (not marry) fifty women, - that is yet to occur but could be linked to the impact on male sperm production of such things as environmental pollution and genetically modified food;
q Universal consumption of alcoholic beverages, - that has already become a veritable plague,
q Religious knowledge disappears, - since the rightly-guided scholars of Islam are demonized, marginalized, banned, or declared to be great security risks. Only those scholars who can skillfully skip and dance to the tunes of those who control power in the world are allowed the unfettered freedom to travel and to preach a sanitized cosmetic version of Islam acceptable to the unholy triple alliance of Britain (‘a day like a year’), America (‘a day like a month’) and Israel (‘a day like a week’), and their equally unholy clients in Islamabad, Cairo, Riyadh, etc.;
q Time would move swiftly - a year passing like a month - a month like a week - a week like a day etc., - and already the perception of swiftly moving time is a universal experience;
q Such prevalence of random killing, murder and violence that a killer would not know why he is killing and the one who is killed would not know why he is being killed, and every age is followed by one which is worse, - already around the world senseless random killing has already arrived and is constantly escalating;
q Nothing would remain of Islam but the name, and nothing would remain of the Qur’an but the traces (of its writing) (i.e., the Qur’an would not be studied, no one would follow its guidance, it would be recited mechanically etc.); the Masajid (mosques) would be grand structures but would be devoid of guidance; and the ulama (religious scholars of Islam who represent such people) would be the worst people beneath the sky. From them would emerge Fitnah (trials) and they would be the centers of Fitnah (since they betray Islam); - there are many distinguished scholars of Islam who declare that this sign has today found fulfillment.
q Prevalence of Riba (i.e, money lent on interest, and transactions which ‘rip off’ people through deception in business, etc.) Around the world today Riba in modern banking and insurance has already taken total control over the market and over economic life.
There are some minor signs which have been couched in enigmatic language such as,
q ‘A slave woman would give birth to her mistress’, - made possible through a combination of Riba and the modern feminist revolution, and
q ‘Naked barefooted shepherds would vie with one another in the construction of high-rise buildings’, - made possible when vast unearned wealth suddenly descends upon a hitherto poor (Arab?) people who now hanker for visible symbols of their status in a modern world which recognizes the rich as a ‘somebody’ and the poor as a ‘nobody’ (see story of the rich man and the poor man in Surah al-Kahf of the Qur’an).
And then there are minor signs which have not as yet occurred such as:
Ø “The Last Hour would not come until there issues from the land of the Hejaz (which is in Saudi Arabia) a fire which will illuminate the backs of the camels in Busra”, - and this, perhaps, anticipates a nuclear attack on a Saudi Air Force base in Tabuk, perhaps, which would formally launch Israel into the club of nuclear powers.
So many of these minor Signs of the Last Day, and so many more not here mentioned, have already occurred, that we can now turn to the major Signs with a clear recognition that we are already living in that last age.
· MAJOR SIGNS
Hudhayfah ibn Usayd Ghifari, the companion of the Prophet, said, “Allah's Messenger came to us all of a sudden as we were (busy in a discussion). He asked: What are you discussing? (The Companions) replied: We are discussing (the subject of) the Last Hour. Thereupon he said: It will not come until you see ten signs, and (in this connection) he made a mention of the Smoke, Dajjal, the Beast, the Rising of the Sun from the West, the Descent of Jesus son of Mary, Gog and Magog, Earthquakes in three places, one in the East, one in the West and one in Arabia at the end of which Fire would burn forth from Yemen, and would drive people to the place of their assembly (i.e., the place where mankind will be assembled for judgment).” Sahih Muslim
Here, then, are the ten major Signs of the Last Day as prophesied by Prophet Muhammad (s):
1. DAJJAL – THE FALSE MESSIAH OR ANTICHRIST,
2. GOG AND MAGOG,
3. SMOKE,
4. THE BEAST OF THE EARTH (or Land),
5. THE SUN WOULD RISE FROM THE WEST,
6. THREE (BIG) EARTHQUAKES – ONE IN THE EAST,
7. ONE IN THE WEST, AND
8. ONE IN ARABIA,
9. A FIRE WOULD COME OUT OF YEMEN AND WOULD DRIVE PEOPLE TO THEIR PLACE OF ASSEMBLY (i.e., to the plain of Arafat where mankind would be assembled for judgment),
10. THE DESCENT OF THE SON OF MARY.
Although these signs were not given by the blessed Prophet (s) in their chronological order of occurrence I have made an effort to put them in that order, with the ones that have not as yet occurred at the bottom of the list. How did I arrive at the above order? Well, we know from the prophecies of the blessed Prophet that the third major earthquake, i.e., the one that would occur in Arabia, would swallow an army that would be heading south to Makkah to attack Imam al-Mahdi, the descendent of Prophet Muhammad who, it was prophesied, would restore the Islamic Caliphate (or Islamic model of a State) in the Arabian peninsular. It is after that sign has occurred (i.e., the third major earthquake) that the son of Mary would descend from the sky with his hands resting on the wings of two angels, and would kill Dajjal the False Messiah or Anti-Christ. And since the Qur’an itself has described Jesus (i.e., the return of Jesus) as the ‘ilm (which here means the very heart and seal of the subject) of the Last Hour (Qur’an, Zukhruf, 43:61), it follows that his return must come chronologically at the end of the list. We also know that the ‘fire’ from Yemen would follow the third earthquake. And so now that it appears that the major earthquake in the East has occurred, we await four more major signs that still remain to occur, i.e. the major earthquake in the West, the major earthquake in Arabia, the fire that would come out of Yemen, and the return of the Messiah, Jesus the son of Mary. The major earthquakes are therefore meant to herald that momentous event of all events when the Messiah, Jesus the son of Mary, would return. When did the first six ‘major’ signs occur?
Ø DAJJAL
I have argued in my book, ‘Jerusalem in the Qur’an – An Islamic View of the Destiny of Jerusalem’ that Dajjal the False Messiah or Antichrist was released into the world in the lifetime of Prophet Muhammad (s). He has already completed the first stage of his mission that lasted for ‘a day like a year’, and is about to complete the second stage that lasts for ‘a day like a month’. The third and last stage of his mission (of impersonation of the true Messiah) that would last for just ‘a day like a week’ would commence when Israel replaces USA as the Ruling State of the world. And that would occur when Israel wages her big war that would result in the dramatic territorial expansion of the State ‘from the river of Egypt to the river Euphrates’. Israel would then seize control of the Suez Canal and all the oil of the Arabian Gulf. By the end of that third stage the Antichrist would have been born into the world of Jewish parents, would have risen to become ruler of Israel and, hence, would have completed his mission to rule the world from Jerusalem. And Allah Knows best! An entire chapter of the book is devoted to explaining the subject of Dajjal.
Ø GOG AND MAGOG
I have also argued in my book that Gog and Magog were released into the world in the lifetime of Prophet Muhammad (s). The Qur’an itself has made mention (Qur’an, the Prophets, 21:94-5) of a ‘town’ which was destroyed by Allah Most High, and the people of the town expelled, and then banned from returning to reclaim their town until Gog and Magog were not only released but, also, had spread out in all directions. I located that ‘town’ to be Jerusalem. And since the Jews have already returned to Jerusalem to reclaim it as their own, it follows that Gog and Magog, like Dajjal, are also close to the end of their mission. And Allah Knows best! Another entire chapter of the book is devoted to explaining the subject of Gog and Magog.
Ø SMOKE
This appears to be the environmental pollution that is already wreaking havoc on the earth itself and is bringing about global warming with the consequent impact on earthquakes, hurricanes, flooding etc. The modern industrial economy appears to be the greatest culprit of environmental pollution in the world today. In other words we, mankind, are ourselves the creators of the Smoke which spawns massive earthquakes, tsunamis, etc., and eventually brings about the death of the earth. And Allah Knows best! However, it is important that we note that there are several Ahadith in Sahih Bukhari which declare that the sign of ‘Smoke’ already appeared in the lifetime of the blessed Prophet.
Ø THE BEAST OF THE EARTH
I have argued in ‘Jerusalem in the Qur’an’ that the word ‘earth’ is sometimes used in the scriptures as synonymous with the word ‘land’, and the term ‘land’, when used in the context of the signs of the last age, stands almost invariably for ‘Holy Land’. In consequence of this I have argued in my book that the ‘Beast of the Earth’ is, in fact, the imposter State of Israel that now occupies the Holy Land. The learned Shaikh, Safar al-Hawali, holds the view that the ‘Beast’ is the Zionist Movement. And Allah Knows best!
Ø THE SUN WOULD RISE FROM THE WEST
Those who interpret this sign literally assume that the order of nature would be reversed despite the Qur’anic declaration that there can be no change in Allah’s creation (of that natural order) (Qur’an, Rum, 30:30), and despite the specific declaration of Prophet Abraham (s) that his Lord-God causes the sun to rise from the East. Abraham then proceeded to challenge the King to cause the sun to rise from the West if he possessed power greater than Allah’s. (Qur’an, al-Baqarah, 2:258) And so they await that western sunrise as an event that would literally occur, while ignoring the basic rule that no Hadith can contradict the Qur’an. But this sign has provoked numerous other non-literal interpretations, all of which agree that it has already occurred. Our view is that the rising of the sun from the West symbolizes an upside–down world in which mankind is led by their noses to a way of life which would be the very opposite of that natural way ordained by Allah. That upside-down unnatural way of life has already embraced most of mankind. In this sense, therefore, the sun is already rising from the West. And Allah Knows best!
THREE EARTHQUAKES
Prophet Muhammad (s) has prophesied three major earthquakes that would herald the return of the Messiah, the son of Mary, and Messenger of Allah Most High. One would occur in the East, the second in the West, and the third in Arabia. When the third one takes place, the world of Islam would suddenly and dazzlingly reenter the affairs of the Arabian peninsular, as well as of the world, in the same revolutionary way that it did in the lifetime of Prophet Muhammad (s). This appears to be the meaning of the last of the major signs (prior to the return of Jesus) mentioned by the Prophet (s), i.e., that a fire would come out of Yemen and drive people to their place of assembly.
Ø THE EARTHQUAKE IN THE EAST
I believe that the recent massive earthquake and resultant tsunami in SE Asia which has claimed many more than 100,000 lives, is the earthquake of the East mentioned by Prophet Muhammad (s) in the ten major Signs of the Last Day, and thus the first of three such earthquakes heralding the return of Jesus (s). I came to this conclusion because of the following reasons:
Firstly, the prophecy of the blessed Prophet is that a ‘khasf’ would occur in the East, i.e., the earth sinks down or caves in. A ‘Tsunami’ is defined as a sea wave of local or distant origin that results from large-scale seafloor displacements associated with large earthquakes, major submarine slides, or exploding volcanic islands. Since this recent displacement of the earth occurred under the sea, and consequently resulted in the massive Tsunamis, it ensured that those who have maliciously concealed the Truth time and again in history could not conceal this major Sign of the Last Day. The magnitude of the event, i.e., the severity of the earthquake (9 on the Richter scale) and, more importantly, the massive damage already done and still unfolding, makes it absolutely unique for mankind today.
Secondly, I am impressed by the location of the event, - it occurred in that East which is clearly East of Madina.
Thirdly, I would like to direct attention to the time that it occurred, i.e., after the liberation of the Holy Land (1917), and return of the Jews to reclaim the Holy Land as their own (1918-1948), the restoration of a State of Israel in the Holy Land (1948), the growth of Israel to become a superpower in the world (i.e., the present), and at precisely that time when Israel is about to wage her big war of massive territorial expansion after which Israel would replace USA as the Ruling State in the world. It has also occurred at that time when the prophecy of the Prophet concerning the abandonment of the Hajj is about to be fulfilled – since the Hajj would henceforth pose a gigantic security threat to the present Saudi ruling elite whenever Israel wages that big war and assumes the rule over the world. And it has occurred at just that time when the US dollar has begun its irreversible decline that is to culminate in its collapse. That would then bring down all the paper-money in the world and electronic money controlled by the Jewish-controlled banking system would then control all the money in the money-system of the world.
This momentous Sign in the East that has just occurred appears, therefore, to be a sign to mankind warning that monstrously dangerous change in the world is about to occur. But it also appears to be the first of the three major earthquakes heralding the return of the Messiah, Jesus the son of Mary, the Messenger of Allah Most High
Ø THE SECOND EARTHQUAKE IN THE WEST
When a second massive earthquake (with a sinking down, caving in, or displacement of the earth) eventually occurs in the West, after the recent one in the East, that would further confirm the analysis presented in this essay. All that would then remain to occur for Jesus to descend from the clouds would be the third earthquake in Arabia that would swallow an entire army, and the fire that would come out of Yemen. We are so close to that event that we can already feel the heat of that fire. My book, ‘Jerusalem in the Qur’an’, explains the subject.
Although what appears to be the first of the three major earthquakes occurred underwater and resulted in the massive tsunamis in South East Asia, it is not necessary that the second, that would occur in the West, would be similar. After all, we know that the third and last major earthquake would have its epicenter on land just north of Makkah in Arabia. And so the West must remain in a state of agonizing suspense.
Ø THE THIRD EARTHQUAKE IN ARABIA
Narrated Aisha: Allah's Apostle said, “An army will invade the Ka'ba and when the invaders reach Al-Baida', all the ground will sink and swallow the whole army." I said, "O Allah's Apostle! How will they sink into the ground while amongst them will be their markets (the people who worked in business and not invaders) and the people not belonging to them?" The Prophet replied, "all of those people will sink but they will be resurrected and judged according to their intentions."
(Sahih al-Bukhari)
“Narrated Umm Salamah, Ummul Mu'minin: The Prophet said: Disagreement will occur at the death of a caliph and a man of the people of Madina will come flying forth to Makkah. Some of the people of Makkah will come to him, bring him out against his will and swear allegiance to him between the Corner and the Maqam. An expeditionary force will then be sent against him from Syria but will be swallowed up in the desert between Makkah and Madina . . .”
(Sunan Abu Daud)
It is quite clear from the above prophecy of Prophet Muhammad (s) that the third earthquake would take place at the time of the advent of Imam al-Mahdi. But the Imam cannot emerge to liberate the Arabian heartland of Islam from Anglo-American-Israeli hegemony, and to restore Dar al-Islam, or the authentic Islamic model of a public order, until Dajjal the False Messiah or Anti-Christ has successfully completed his mission of impersonating the true Messiah, and hence until Israel has become the Ruling State in the world and has ruled the world for ‘a day like a week’. And so there is quite some time left (maybe as much as 40-50 years) before that third earthquake takes place and the moment finally arrives for the last of the signs of the Last Day to occur, i.e., the descent of the true Messiah, Jesus, the son of Mary. And Allah knows best!
Ø THE RETURN OF JESUS
Prophet Muhammad (s) has spoken extensively and in minute details about the event of the return of Jesus (s). But that event is so rich and complex that it lies beyond the scope of this paper. However, my book, ‘Jerusalem in the Qur’an’ has dealt with the subject in some detail, and it is to that book that I now refer the gentle reader.
Ø ONE FINAL WORD
The destiny of Jerusalem is such as to give to Muslims the greatest confidence and hope that Truth will triumph over falsehood and oppression. ‘Jerusalem in the Qur’an’ was written for precisely this purpose -- to explain to Muslims the strange world in which we live today. It is a world in which the cause of Islam appears to be a lost cause. But having read the book the reader would know, if he or she had not already known it, that the reality is quite different. When they know for certain that it is the destiny of Jerusalem to give a spectacular validation of Islam’s claim to truth, Muslims should be able to summon the strength to resist the present war on Islam in which the godless world is making the greatest possible effort to destroy their faith in Allah Most High.
