Paradise levels

A Garden Without End

A Garden Without End Review of Chapter 23 of Bihar Al-Anwaar, Volume 8
Author – The Allama Muhammad
Baqir Al Majlisi

Chapter 23 of Volume 8 of Bihar Al-Anwaar – the encyclopaedic hadith compendium compiled by the Safavid-era scholar Allama Muhammad Baqir al-Majlisi – is entitled “The Paradise and Its Bounties, and Allah Sustaining Us and the Rest of the Believers, Its Houries, Its Castles, Its Joys and Its Cheerfulness.” Spanning roughly one hundred and eighty pages (pp. 106–285), it sits in the volume between the harrowing chapter on the Bridge over Hell and the chapter on the Fire itself, and it functions as a deliberate counterweight: where the preceding chapters describe terror, this one unfolds an almost luxuriant catalogue of delight. Reading it straight through is a peculiar experience – less a sustained argument than a long, liturgical inventory of a world the believer is invited to imagine as already in existence. This review summarises the chapter’s main themes and offers a few observations on its literary and theological texture.

Islamic Eschatology

Blowing Of The Trumpet And Annihilation Of Everything

Blowing Of The Trumpet And Annihilation Of Everything by Allama Mohammad Baqer Majlesi

Many verses prove the blowing of the trumpet. In Shi’a and Sunni channels, many traditions say that the Almighty Allah created Israfil and, along with him, a great trumpet, with one end in the east and the other in the west. From the day Israfil was created, he has been waiting for the command of Allah, with his mouth touching that trumpet.

Wealth

Wealth, Deeds, and the Day of Reckoning

Wealth, Deeds, and the Day of Reckoning by Dr Imranali Sibtain Panjwani

urah al-Masad is one of the shortest chapters of the Qur’an, yet it carries a philosophical weight far beyond its length. The surah singles out Abu Lahab, the uncle of the Prophet (peace be upon him), for his relentless hostility toward the message of Islam – a hostility that extended to verbal abuse, mockery, and active efforts to obstruct the transmission of revelation. Having already examined the surah’s opening verse, in which Allah declares “perish the hands of Abu Lahab, and he did perish,” attention now turns to the second verse: “Neither his wealth availed him, nor what he had earned.”