PURPOSE OF MAN’S CREATION
As per the divine plan, man must develop a spiritual personality in the pre-death period so that he can be selected as a deserving candidate for Paradise—his habitat—in the post-death period.
The well-known American evangelist Billy Graham (1918-2018) narrates one of his life experiences. Once, he received an urgent message from an American statesman who wanted to meet him as soon as possible. On receiving this message, Billy Graham cancelled his appointments and immediately set out to meet this man. When he arrived at the statesman’s palatial home, he was immediately taken to a room where Billy Graham and the statesman sat on chairs facing one another. Then, in a serious tone, the statesman said to Billy Graham:
“You see, I am an old man. Life has lost all meaning. I am ready to take a fateful leap into the unknown. Young man, can you give me a ray of hope?” (The Secret of Happiness, Billy Graham, 1955, p.2)
This is a common question. Every man and woman—consciously or unconsciously—has this question in their mind. This is the first concern of every human being. To find the real answer, we have to try to understand the Creation Plan of God. God is the Creator of this world. Only by gaining an understanding of the Creator’s Plan can we get the right answer to the question.
The Quran, the preserved Book of God, answers this question. According to the Quran, man is born as an eternal being, but his life span is divided into two parts: the pre-death period and the post-death period. The pre-death period is very short, and the post-death period is eternal.
Everyone feels that they have enormous desires, but they are not able to fulfil them. The reason is that the present world is imperfect and has many limitations.
This means that there is a contradiction between man’s nature, which seeks fulfilment of his desires, and the world, which is incapable of fulfilling man’s desires. Man, by nature, wants a world where his personality can find total fulfilment, but the present world fails to provide such fulfilment.
Sir James Jeans, in his book, ‘The Mysterious Universe,’ rightly points out this fact in the following words: ‘It appears that man has strayed into a world that was not made for him’.
According to the Quran, the present earth is not a habitat for man forever. Man’s eternal habitat lies in the world Hereafter. In accordance with the Creation Plan of God, man must develop a spiritual personality in the pre-death period so that he is selected as a deserving candidate for this habitat or Paradise in the post-death period.
