My contention has been that for the vast majority of Muslims and Islamic teachers and scholars, Hell is a very real place whose inhabitants can expect the most appalling torture imaginable (Allah being all-powerful and all-knowing can, after all, create the ultimate in pain)
I visited iERA (Islamic Education and Research Association) to see if they could help clarify matters. The founding member and chairman of iERA, Abdurraheem Green, is apparently in no doubt.
Here are some highlights of a lecture he has given on more than one occasion...(Please don't read if you have a weak stomach)
"Hell is a place where Allah will burn the skins of the people and then will recreate their skins and burn the skins again so that the people will taste the punishment. It is a place of heat, a place of pain, a place of suffering. The people will cry in agony [...] for a drink and they will be given a drink. It will be a boiling water that will scald their faces and burn their insides. And they will drink from a river that is made of the puss that flows out from the wounds of the people in the hell-fire. [...] The smallest punishment will be their brain will boil."And so it goes on and on, the speaker seemingly taking great delight in the details.
This is not a metaphor for the iERA.
Nor, as far as I can tell, is it anything other than a terrifyingly real threat for most scholars, imams or Muslims the world over.
Hell is real, my friend.
ReplyDeleteThe iERA is a registered charity (Registered Charity Number: 1134566)
ReplyDeleteIt gets tax relief to spread fear and terror.
This Telegraph article gives some interesting info on Hamza Tzortzis of iERA: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/education/educationnews/7012827/Speaker-with-extremist-links-to-address-Detroit-bombers-former-student-group.html
ReplyDeleteWhether one understands the descriptions of hell as metaphors or literal---the concept is real for Muslims and all Muslims believe in hell and also believe that if they do bad things and arrogantly ignore God's Compassion and Mercy---that they will go to hell. However, along with this belief also comes related concepts that God is most Just and therefore does not arbitrarily assign someone to hell, that God is Most Merciful and Compassionate and forgives those who ask for forgiveness and that God will reward those who do good with Paradise.
ReplyDeleteIn our own societies we have a justice system that puts bad people in Jail. But most people do not spend their lives being obsessed about going to jail---they spend their time living to the best of their abilities. If some alien were to feel pity for human beings because our socieites have jails and they assume we are "oppressed people living under threat"
this would not reflect the reality of the lives of most humans......
by the way---I previously mentioned that the Quran uses literary devises to get its message across---the horrifying imagery in the video are in the Quran also---but in the Quran these are juxtaposed with images of paradise creating a higher level of emotional response (shock value).
ReplyDelete