The Resurrection
The Seventh Aspect
Come, let us take a short walk and see what there is among this civilized people. Look, on every street corner there are cameras recording everything. Everywhere there are scribes noting down what they observe. They record everything, from the smallest services to the simplest events. And notice: there, on that high mountain, stands an enormous camera belonging specifically to the ruler, recording everything that happens here.[1] This means that this mighty ruler has commanded that every event and action within his dominion be registered and recorded. Indeed, these precise recordings and registrations undoubtedly point to a future accounting.
Is it at all possible that such a ruler, who preserves everything and does not neglect even the smallest actions of his simplest subjects, would not record the most important actions of his most important subjects, would not call them to account, and would not reward or punish them? Yet we see unforgivable actions that offend the honor and dignity of this ruler. They are committed by some of his most important subjects, but they are not punished in this world. This means that their reckoning has been left to a court of ultimate judgment.
The Eighth Aspect
Come, I shall read to you the decrees issued by this ruler. Look, he repeatedly makes promises and gives stern threats of punishment, saying: “I shall take you from here and bring you to the center of my dominion. There I shall bestow happiness upon those who obey me and cast those who disobey me into dungeons. I shall destroy this temporary dwelling and establish another land, containing everlasting palaces and dungeons.”
Moreover, he can fulfill what he promises with the greatest ease, and his promise is of immense importance for his subjects. And failing to fulfill his promise is entirely contrary to his majestic authority and honor.
Now look carefully, O confused one! You accept the claims of your misleading imagination, your foolish intellect, and your deceptive nafsThe aspect of the soul associated with lower desires and negative traits.. Yet you deny the words of One Who can in no way be compelled to break His promise, Whose dignity neither permits nor allows such faithlessness, and Whose truthfulness is testified to by all His visible actions.
- Some of the truths referred to in this aspect are treated in the Seventh Truth. The enormous camera belonging specifically to the ruler refers to Lawh-i MahfūzThe Preserved Tablet, the immaterial record in which everything that has occurred and everything that will occur has been inscribed in detail.. The existence of Lawh-i MahfūzThe Preserved Tablet, the immaterial record in which everything that has occurred and everything that will occur has been inscribed in detail. is proved in The Twenty-Sixth Word as follows: just as the personal records of individuals indicate the existence of a great database, small accounts point to the existence of a great ledger, and the presence of small various streams reveals the existence of a great water source, so too the memories of human beings, the fruits of trees, and the kernels of fruits—which all serve as the personal records of individual beings, as small examples of Lawh-i MahfūzThe Preserved Tablet, the immaterial record in which everything that has occurred and everything that will occur has been inscribed in detail., and as tiny drawn points dripping from the pen that has written Lawh-i Mahfūz—undoubtedly point to the greatest memory, the greatest ledger, the greatest Lawh-i MahfūzThe Preserved Tablet, the immaterial record in which everything that has occurred and everything that will occur has been inscribed in detail.. Truly, they prove its existence and even display it to the perceptive intellect. ↩︎