EVIDENCE OF GOD AND THE HEREAFTER
Our world is so meaningful that, in itself, it is evident that its Creator has a deep awareness of meaningfulness. Such a Creator cannot create a defective universe in terms of its conclusion. It is impossible that a meaningful Creator would create a meaningless universe.
However, despite all its meaningfulness, the universe, with respect to man, is defective in its present state. Therefore, for its completion, it requires another world. It is this other world that the Prophets of God have referred to as the world of the Hereafter.
The well-known American Christian missionary Billy Graham (d. 2018) once received an urgent message from an American billionaire who requested him to meet him urgently. When he met him, the man said to him:
“You see, I am an old man. Life has lost all meaning. I am going to take a fateful leap into the unknown. Young man, can you give me a ray of hope?” (The Secret of Happiness, by Billy Graham, p.2)
This question is not just of one American billionaire alone. Instead, every person who takes birth is faced with this question. The rational answer to this question can be found only in the belief in the world after death or the Hereafter. This question will remain unanswered if one does not accept the world Hereafter.
All religions have a concept of the Hereafter, a life that follows the body’s death. However, the world of the Hereafter is not an issue of religious belief alone. It is also an utterly intellectual phenomenon. Therefore, the existence of the world Hereafter can be proven based on the same academic criteria used to verify all other things in science.
Scientific Evidence for the Hereafter
In this regard, one should first know what scientific proof is. According to contemporary science, scientific proof is not in which one arrives at absolute certainty in a particular matter. This sort of certainty is not possible about anything. In modern science, the theories accepted as established are recognized not because they have been definitively proven through observation but because they have been proven at the level of probability. Accepting the structure of the atom as a reality is one such example.
To prove the existence of the world of the Hereafter, we can also employ the same accepted scientific method. In such matters, the scientific method has three components: hypothesis, observation and verification. Suppose this ‘three-point formula’ is used for the question of the Hereafter. In that case, we certainly arrive at the favourable probability or supportive possibility of the existence of the Hereafter—and it has been said that arriving at a possibility is another name for certainty.
By birth, every human being possesses two contradictory qualities. On the one hand, everyone has an intense desire to build a dream world of their own, a world that is per their ideal, where they can spend the ‘tomorrow’ period of their life in joy and comfort. However, on the other hand, everyone is sunk in the contradiction that despite obtaining many of the things they desire, they can still not build and live in their desired world. Hence, boredom, sickness, accidents, old age, and, generally in less than 100 years, death—this is man’s story in this world.
This is the case with every human being. Everyone is born with the concept of an ideal embedded in their mind. However, each one takes their beautiful longings with them and dies before they can find their desired world.
Here, an observation comes to the fore to help us understand this seeming conundrum. In the present world, the principle of pairs prevails. Here, everything is found in the form of a pair. Everything becomes complete when two of a pair unite: in atoms, a negative particle and a positive particle; in the world of stars, pair stars; in the world of plants, male and female; in the world of animals, masculine and feminine; and in the world of human beings, men and women.
This natural principle can be called the ‘pair principle.’ This principle informs us that everything completes itself by joining with its pair in this world. The answer to the above-mentioned apparent conundrum is found in this global principle. In line with the ‘pair principle,’ this present world must have a pair world, another world, which is its pair. Only by meeting this other world can the present world complete its existence.
In light of this observation, the point can be verified that the concept of the world of the Hereafter is true. The world of the Hereafter is the pair of the present world, joining with which the present world completes its existence. Without the Hereafter, our present world is incomplete, like all other things in the universe remain incomplete without their pair.
There is also a pair of worlds for man—the present world and the world of the Hereafter—which is extremely meaningful. After accepting the world of the Hereafter, human existence becomes a complete existence. Everything now obtains its meaningfulness. All things now fall into place. We can now understand that only in the Hereafter can man find the satisfaction of all those fine longings and desires that cannot be fulfilled in this present world, provided he has lived appropriately while in this world.
Study reveals that nothing has been made futilely, without a purpose. Be it the sun or the moon, insects, trees, minerals, or various gases, all of these things have been created in line with some purpose, fulfilling it. However, there is only one thing in this world that, on its face, seems to be without meaning—the beautiful desires and longings embedded inside every human being by birth itself. No person is devoid of these desires and longings. Therefore, when everything else has been made with a definite purpose, man’s finer desires and longings must have a real destination. Man’s finer desires and yearnings cannot be purposeless in a universe where everything is purposeful.
Indeed, these finer desires and longings are a planned creation. There is a very definite and clear purpose for their existence. However, this purpose cannot be fulfilled in the present world. These desires and longings are limitless and can only be fulfilled in an unlimited world after death—the name for this eternal world is the Hereafter.
Proper Framework
The concept of the Hereafter provides us with a framework in which life and everything in it can find its satisfactory explanation. Through this concept, the reality of Paradise and Hell becomes clear. Paradise is, as it were, the resting place for virtuous believers, while Hell is the place for punishment for those who revolt against God and ally with evil.
An understanding that emerges in line with this is that the present world has been made as a testing ground while the next world is where one will obtain one’s final result. By birth, man has been created as an eternal creature. Everyone has been given a distinct personality that will always remain alive and have an eternal existence. That being said, man’s life is like an iceberg. A tiny portion of the iceberg is visible above the sea’s surface, while the rest, a much more significant portion, is invisible below the surface. In the same way, man’s lifespan is divided into two parts: one, a tiny piece, has been placed in the present world, while a considerable portion—which will continue forever—has been kept in the world of the Hereafter.
Everything in the present world is a test paper for man. Everything in this world exists so that man can develop his personality. For example, the present world is filled with all kinds of unwanted situations. This is so that, passing through these experiences, man can give evidence that even in unfavourable conditions, he can live with positive feelings. Only people with such a positive personality will be admitted to the ideal world of Paradise. In contrast, those who fall prey to reaction and who, amid negative experiences, become negative will be deemed unqualified for Paradise. These people with a negative personality will be dumped in the dustbin of the universe, from where they will never be able to emerge.
A Satisfactory Explanation
In light of this, it can be said that in accepting the world of the Hereafter, one obtains a satisfactory explanation of human life. In contrast, in the event of not accepting the reality of the world of the Hereafter, everything remains inexplicable, and the present world appears to be woefully incomplete and utterly absurd.
In accepting the world of the Hereafter, the fact that many truthful and virtuous people depart from the world while having received no reward for their goodness here becomes understandable, for we now know that they shall receive justice in the Hereafter.
Without the concept of the Hereafter, we cannot understand why many people engage in evil but do not receive any punishment for their wickedness here. However, one gets a satisfactory answer on accepting the reality of the Hereafter, for one learns that the unjust will have to face punishment for all their actions.
Similarly, in the event of not accepting the reality of the Hereafter, one cannot understand how and why man takes birth here with a concept of an ideal world, but each person finally departs from this world without obtaining this perfect world. By accepting the reality of the Hereafter, this dilemma is fully resolved. Man can now live in this present world with the conviction that he might be able to obtain in the world after death the things that he desired but could not get in the world before death.
In this limitless world of the Hereafter, the virtuous people will be admitted into Paradise, which will be filled with every sort of joy and comfort. However, in contrast to them, those who proved evil in the present world will be in eternal deprivation in the world of the Hereafter.
