View source for Islamic eschatology

{{Short description|Aspect of Islamic theology concerning the end times and afterlife}}
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{{Eschatology}}
{{Islam|expanded=Related}}
'''Islamic eschatology''' includes the [[afterlife]], apocalyptic signs of the [[Eschatology|End Times]], and [[Last Judgment]].<ref name="EoQ1">{{cite encyclopedia |author-last=Smith |author-first=Jane I. |year=2006 |title=Eschatology |editor-last=McAuliffe |editor-first=Jane Dammen |editor-link=Jane Dammen McAuliffe |encyclopedia=[[Encyclopaedia of the Qurʾān]] |volume=II |location=[[Leiden]] |publisher=[[Brill Publishers]] |doi=10.1163/1875-3922_q3_EQCOM_00055 |isbn=978-90-04-14743-0}}</ref><ref name="EoQ2">{{cite encyclopedia |author-last=Hasson |author-first=Isaac |year=2006 |title=Last Judgment |editor-last=McAuliffe |editor-first=Jane Dammen |editor-link=Jane Dammen McAuliffe |encyclopedia=[[Encyclopaedia of the Qurʾān]] |volume=III |location=[[Leiden]] |publisher=[[Brill Publishers]] |doi=10.1163/1875-3922_q3_EQCOM_00105 |isbn=978-90-04-14743-0}}</ref><ref name=":3">{{cite web|date=2008-05-06|title=Eschatology - Oxford Islamic Studies Online|url=http://www.oxfordislamicstudies.com/article/opr/t125/e588?_hi=1&_pos=2|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140423115519/http://www.oxfordislamicstudies.com/article/opr/t125/e588?_hi=1&_pos=2|url-status=dead|archive-date=23 April 2014|access-date=2017-07-03|publisher=Oxfordislamicstudies.com}}</ref> It is fundamental to [[Islam]], as life after death is one of the  religion's [[Iman (Islam)#Six Pillars of Faith|Six Pillars]]. Resurrection is divided into Lesser Resurrection (''{{Transliteration|ar|al-qiyamah al-sughra|}}'') and Greater Resurrection ({{Transliteration|ar|al-qiyamah al-kubra|}}). The former deals with the time between an individual's death and the Last Judgement. Islam acknowledges bodily resurrection. Only a few philosophers are an exception.

From the 8th or 9th century onwards, Muslims increasingly believed that the day of the Greater Resurrection would be announced by several signs of an impending apocalypse. Such beliefs are recorded and elaborated upon in apocalyptic literature, which introduced new figures absent in the [[Quran]], such as the ''[[Dajjal]]'' ([[Antichrist]]) and ''[[Mahdi]]'' (Savior). Although some themes are common across all works, there is no standardized version of apocalyptic events.

Closely related is the matter of the fate of the individual, with branches of Islam reaching different conclusions. The [[Mu'tazilism|Mu'tazilites]] hold that God's goodness obligates God to reward good actions and to punish evil actions. The [[Asharism|Asharites]] believe that God neither needs to punish sins nor reward good ones. Like [[Maturidism|Maturidis]], Asharis hold, in contrast to Mu'tazilites, that sinners among Muslims will eventually leave [[Jahannam|Hell]]. Asharis and [[Twelver Shi’ism|Twelver Shias]] generally agree that [[Islam and other religions|non-Muslims]] who refuse to acknowledge [[Muhammad in Islam|Muhammad]] as the last prophet go to Hell. [[Neo-Salafis]], such as [[Umar Sulaiman Al-Ashqar]], hold that Muslims of other sects also go to Hell, although [[Sunnis]] and Twelver Shias may leave Hell eventually.

Another topic of discussion is the temporal place of [[Jannah|Paradise]] and Hell. According to most Sunnis and [[Shias]], Paradise and Hell coexist with and influence the contemporary world. Throughout Muslim literature, visits to and depictions of Paradise and Hell are vividly described. Mu'tazilites, on the other hand, argue that the purpose of Paradise and Hell is to reward or punish and are thus only created after the Last Judgment.

== The ''Dunyā/Ākhirah'' divide ==
[[File:Islamic-Eschatology.png|thumb|''Dunyā'' and ''Ākhirah'' as merismos. Rather than being temporally distinct, the Quran depicts the otherworldly realms as spatially divided. However, both worlds are contiguous with the earth to the extent that they influence each other. On Judgement Day, the Earth disappears and Paradise and Hell collapse into each other.<ref name="Lange-2016"/>{{rp|p=43}}]]
[[File:Pomegranate flower and fruit.jpg|thumb|Pomegranate flower and fruit, considered a fruit from paradise in Muslim tradition. Therefore, it is used as an ingredient in a dessert ([[Ashure]]) used to commemorate prophetic events.]]
Islam, like [[Christianity]], conceptualizes the relationship between ''Dunyā'' (world) and ''Ākhirah'' (hereafter) in a diachronic timeline.<ref name="Lange-2016"/>{{rp|p=8}} Humanity's history in the world begins with the Fall of [[Adam in Islam|Adam]] and ends with God's Judgement.<ref name="Lange-2016"/>{{rp|p=8}} In contrast to Christianity, however, Adam's fall does not result in an utter separation from the transcendent world.<ref name="Lange-2016"/>{{rp|p=8}} The two otherworldly abodes (paradise and hell) exist in proximity, both in a spatial as well as in a temporal sense, to the ''Dunyā''.<ref name="Lange-2016"/>{{rp|p=11}}

Since in Islamic beliefs, God does not reside in paradise, Islamic tradition was able to bridge the world and the hereafter without violating God's transcendence.<ref name="Lange-2016"/>{{rp|p=11}} Islamic literature is filled with interactions between the world and the hereafter and the world is closely intertwined with both paradise and hell.<ref name="Lange-2016"/>{{rp|p=9}} [[Muhammad in Islam|Muhammad]] visited during his ''[[Isra and Mi'raj|Miʿrāj]]'' (Night Journey) both paradise and hell.<ref name="Lange-2016"/>{{rp|p=6}} The same is said about the Islamic prophet [[Idris (prophet)|ʾIdrīs]].<ref name="Lange-2016"/>{{rp|p=6}} The palm-tree as well as the pomegranate are supposed to originate from paradise.<ref name="Lange-2016"/>{{rp|p=8}} A ''[[Walī]]'' (saint) grabs a pomegranate out of a vision from paradise.<ref name="Lange-2016"/>{{rp|p=233}} Muhammad reportedly states that river flows from hell.<ref name="Lange-2016"/>{{rp|p=10}} The infernal tree [[Zaqqum]] manifests in this world.<ref name="Lange-2016"/>{{rp|p=9}} Some animals, scorpions and snakes in particular, are said to travel between the world and hell.<ref name="Lange-2016"/>{{rp|p=9}} People may interact with the souls of the deceased, receive blessings, or ease the dead's abode in the otherworld.<ref>Kinberg, L. (1986). Interaction between this world and the afterworld in early Islamic tradition. Oriens, 29, 307-308.</ref> [[Maturidi|Māturīdi scholar]] [[Abu al-Layth al-Samarqandi]] (944–983) explains that the otherworldly abodes coexist in order to inspire hope and cause fear.<ref name="Lange-2016">{{cite book |last= Lange|first= Christian|author-link= |date= 2016|title= Paradise and Hell in Islamic Traditions|url= |location= Cambridge United Kingdom|publisher= Cambridge University Press|page= |isbn=978-0-521-50637-3}}</ref>{{rp|p=168}}

The overlap of the earthly and otherworldly domain is anchored in the [[Quran]] itself.<ref name="Lange-2016"/>{{rp|p=41}} Challenging the pre-Islamic Arabian conception of time (''dahr'') as a linear and irreversible process, time has become subject to God.<ref name="Lange-2016"/>{{rp|p=40}} In general, the Quran "is lacking a notion of time as divided into past, present and future."<ref name="Lange-2016"/>{{rp|p=40}} Therefore, Quranic eschatology cannot be understood through a linear conceptualization of time.<ref name="Lange-2016"/>{{rp|p=41}} The difference between the earth and the otherworld is not that of time but rather that of space.<ref name="Lange-2016"/>{{rp|p=41}} Paradise and hell are spatially connected to earth. At Judgement Day, paradise and hell do not perish, nor are they created anew, rather paradise and hell are "brought near" (26:90-91) Before that event, paradise is suggested to be somewhere in the high regions of the world and hell located in the depths.<ref name="Lange-2016"/>{{rp|p=42}}

The coexistence of the ''dunyā'' with the otherworld was contested by the [[Mu'tazila]].<ref name=JISYYHIU1981:92>[[#JISYYHIU1981|Smith & Haddad, ''Islamic Understanding'',  1981]]: p.92</ref> They argued that since before the Day of Resurrection all except God will be destroyed by the [[Israfil|trumpet]], paradise and hell have no function until after the annihilation of the world. However, God creates only with a purpose. By denying the stay of souls in either abode, paradise and hell have no function before the Day of Judgement and thus, must be created afterwards.<ref name=JISYYHIU1981:92/><ref name="Lange-2016"/>{{rp|p=167-168}} Māturīdism objects by asserting that paradise and hell do fulfill the before mentioned functions. [[Ash'ariya]] argued that although the trumpet's sounding will precede all being destroyed, creation was a "constant process".<ref name=JISYYHIU1981:92/><ref name=":12">{{Cite book|title=The Islamic understanding of death and resurrection|last=Smith, Jane I.|date=1981|publisher=State University of New York Press|others=Haddad, Yvonne Yazbeck, 1935–|isbn=0873955064|location=Albany|pages=92|oclc=6666779}}</ref>

[[Kalam|Muslim theologians]] (''mutakallimun'') referred to multiple verses of the Quran for evidence that paradise and hell coexist with the current world. It is implied someone has gone to the Garden or the hell (3:169, 36:13-26, 66:10, 3:10-11, 6:93).<ref name=CLPaHiIT2016:40/> In the [[Adam and Eve|Story of Adam and Eve]], they once resided in Garden of Eden, which is often considered to be Jannah. This identification, however, is not universal. [[Mundhir ibn Sa'īd al-Ballūṭī|Al-Balluti]] (887 – 966) reasoned that the Garden of Eden lacked the perfection and eternal character of a final paradise:<ref name="Lange-2016"/>{{rp|p=167}} Adam and Eve lost the primordial paradise, while the paradisiacal afterlife lasts forever; if Adam and Eve were in the otherworldly paradise, the [[Shaitan|devil]] (''Shaiṭān'') could not have entered and deceived them, since there is no evil or idle talk in paradise; Adam slept in his garden, but there is no sleep in paradise.<ref name="Lange-2016"/>{{rp|p=167}}

The discussion may have been incited by [[Jahm bin Safwan|Jahm bin Ṣafwān]] who claimed that paradise and hell will end, but coexist with the world. Insisting on the impermanence of everything but God, he asserts that "eternity" is used [[Hyperbole|hyperbolically]] and means that people abide in paradise and hell only as long as both worlds last.<ref name="Lange-2016"/>{{rp|p=169}} Most Sunnis, however, hold the opinion that paradise and hell are eternal.<ref name="Lange-2016"/>{{rp|p=169}}

== Apocalyptic literature ==
There is no universally accepted apocalyptic tradition among either [[Sunnism|Sunnis]] or [[Shia Islam|Shias]].<ref>Cook, D. (2002). Studies in Muslim apocalyptic (Vol. 21). Princeton: Darwin Press. p. 300</ref> The Quran is primarily an eschatological work, not an apocalyptic one.<ref>Cook, D. (2002). Studies in Muslim apocalyptic (Vol. 21). Princeton: Darwin Press. p. 9</ref> The Quran, concerned about the impending Day of Judgement, leaves no room for apocalyptic events in the far future.<ref>Cook, D. (2002). Studies in Muslim apocalyptic (Vol. 21). Princeton: Darwin Press. p. 301</ref> Apocalyptic narratives are only composed 150-200 years later from different religious elements.<ref>Cook, D. (2002). Studies in Muslim apocalyptic (Vol. 21). Princeton: Darwin Press. p. 9; 301</ref> The first known complete Islamic apocalyptic work is the ''Kitāb al-Fitan'' (Book of Tribulations) by [[Naim ibn Hammad]].<ref>Whittingham, M. (2020). A history of Muslim views of the Bible: the first four centuries (Vol. 7). Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co KG. p. 77</ref>

The extensive usage of [[Hebrew language|Hebrew]] and [[Syriac language|Syriac]] vocabulary in Islamic apocalyptic writings suggests that apocalyptic narratives formed from vivid exchange between different religious traditions.<ref>Cook, D. (2002). Studies in Muslim apocalyptic (Vol. 21). Princeton: Darwin Press. p. 299</ref> These exchanges most likely did not happen among scholars, but [[Oral tradition|orally]] among the uneducated masses.<ref>Cook, D. (2002). Studies in Muslim apocalyptic (Vol. 21). Princeton: Darwin Press. p. 2</ref> A lot of apocalyptic material is attributed to [[Ka'b al-Ahbar]] and [[List of converts to Islam from Judaism|former Jewish converts to Islam]], while other transmitters indicate a Christian background.<ref>Cook, D. (2002). Studies in Muslim apocalyptic (Vol. 21). Princeton: Darwin Press. p. 7-9</ref><ref name=":0">{{Cite web |last=Stowasser |first=Barbara Freyer |title=The End is Near: Minor and Major Signs of the Hour in Islamic Texts and Context |url=https://www.files.ethz.ch/isn/46623/MESV6-3.pdf |date=2002 |website=[[ETH Zurich]] |access-date=17 April 2022}}</ref> Christian apocalyptic literature was known at latest since the 9th century in Arabic.<ref>Cook, D. (2002). Studies in Muslim apocalyptic (Vol. 21). Princeton: Darwin Press. p. 109</ref>

Although apocalyptic literature barely cites the Quran, the narratives refer and paraphrase Islamic sacred scripture.<ref name=":4">Cook, D. (2002). Studies in Muslim apocalyptic (Vol. 21). Princeton: Darwin Press. p. 302</ref> In contrast to the method of usage of ''[[Hadith|ḥadīth]]'', apocalyptic literature dictates the Quran rather than explaining the text.<ref name=":4" /> Thus, [[David Cook (historian)|David Cook]] suggested that at a certain point, the Quran was rather competing with apocalyptic literature than they were complementary.<ref name=":4" />

Islamic apocalyptic narratives were later expanded and developed by Islamic authors notably [[Al-Shaykh Al-Mufid]], [[al-Ghazali]], [[Ibn Arabi]], [[Al-Qurtubi]], [[Ibn Kathir]], and [[as-Suyuti]]).<ref name="EoI2">{{cite book |last=Gardet |first=L. |title=''Qiyama'' |publisher=[[Encyclopaedia of the Qurʾān]]}}</ref><ref name=":5">Cook, D. (2002). Studies in Muslim apocalyptic (Vol. 21). Princeton: Darwin Press. p. 269-306</ref> The authors list various signs as meanings of the arrivals of the apocalypse.<ref name=":0" /> Some references to the Quran  were frequently understood in apocalyptic terms, such as ''[[Fitna (word)|fitna]]'',<ref name=":6">Reeves, J. C. (2005). Trajectories in Near Eastern apocalyptic: a postrabbinic Jewish apocalypse reader (No. 45). Society of Biblical Lit. p. 109</ref><ref name=":5" /> ''[[Beast of the Earth|Dabba]]'', and [[Gog and Magog]].<ref name=":5" /> At the time of the [[History of Islam#Mongol conquests|Mongol conquests]], ibn Kathir identified the latter with the historical Turks and Mongols.<ref name=":5" /> The apocalyptic writings frequently feature extra-Quranic figures such as the ''[[Dajjal|Dajjāl]]'' (corresponding to [[Armilos]] and [[Anti-Christ]]) and the ''[[Mahdi|Mahdīy]]''.<ref name=":5" /><ref name="Farhang Dajjal 2017">{{cite encyclopedia |year=2017 |title=Dajjāl |encyclopedia=Encyclopaedia Islamica |publisher=[[Brill Publishers]] |location=[[Leiden]] and [[Boston]] |editor1-last=Madelung |editor1-first=Wilferd |doi=10.1163/1875-9831_isla_COM_035982 |issn=1875-9823 |author-last=Farhang |author-first=Mehrvash |translator-last=Negahban |translator-first=Farzin |editor2-last=Daftary |editor2-first=Farhad}}</ref><ref name=":6" /> The ''Dajjāl'' is supposed to become a cause of misguidance and causes havoc on earth, but is ultimately stopped by either the ''Mahdīy'' or [[Jesus in Islam|Jesus]], who returns from heaven.<ref>Hamid, F.A. (2008). 'The Futuristic Thought of Ustaz Ashaari Muhammad of Malaysia', p. 209, in  I. Abu-Rabi' (ed.) [https://books.google.com/books?id=Sf6HxVjOLPsC ''The Blackwell Companion to Contemporary Islamic Thought'']. Malden: Blackwell Publishing, pp.195–212</ref><ref name="Cook 2021">{{cite book |last=Cook |first=David |author-link=David Cook (historian) |year=2021 |orig-date=2002 |title=Studies in Muslim Apocalyptic |location=[[Berlin]] and [[London]] |publisher=Gerlach Press |pages=93–104 |isbn=9783959941211 |oclc=238821310}}</ref>

According to [[Islamic eschatology#Apocalyptic Literature|Islamic apocalyptic literature]], the [[day of judgement]] (or {{langx|ar|یوم الدین|Yawm ad-din|Day of Judgement|italic=no}}) will be preceded by a number of immoralities and [[Disaster|catastrophes]], as well as the advent of apocalyptic figures. They are loosely based on the [[Quran]] and the [[hadith]],<ref>Cook, D. (2002). Studies in Muslim apocalyptic (Vol. 21). Princeton: Darwin Press. p. 9</ref> collected around 150–200 years after the canonization of Islamic scripture and features several elements from other religions.<ref>Cook, D. (2002). Studies in Muslim apocalyptic (Vol. 21). Princeton: Darwin Press. p. 9; 301</ref> There is no canonical accepted version of the signs of the Endtimes by either [[Sunnis]] or [[Shias]].<ref>Cook, D. (2002). Studies in Muslim apocalyptic (Vol. 21). Princeton: Darwin Press. p. 300</ref> While interpretations of what the Quran and hadith say about the end times are "diverse and complex", the signs of Judgment Day's arrival include disruptions in the order of both human morality and the natural world; but also the appearance of dajjal and prophet Isa , which "is seen to represent the ultimate victory of the [[ummah]] of Islam ... in some senses".<ref name="JISYYHIU1981:67">[[Signs of the coming of Judgement Day#JISYYHIU1981|Smith & Haddad, ''Islamic Understanding'', 1981]]: p.67</ref>

Traditionally interest in "apocalyptic speculation" was strongest among mainstream Shia ([[Twelver Shia]]), Isma'ili Islam, Sunni on the "doctrinal and geographic margins"—such as present day Morocco—but was weaker in the heartland of Sunni Islam.<ref name="JPFAiI2011:49">[[Signs of the coming of Judgement Day#JPFAiI2011|Filiu, ''Apocalypse in Islam '', 2011]]: p.49</ref> Various eschatological interpretations exist within Shia Islam. The concept of seven celestial Hells, as well as the idea that after death but before the End Times, one's soul would temporarily wait in either Paradise or Hellfire, are accounted for throughout Isma'ili Shi'i literature.<ref name="worldcat.org2">{{Cite book |title=Locating Hell in Islamic traditions |publisher=Brill |year=2015 |isbn=9789004301214 |editor=Lange, Christian |oclc=945783598}}</ref> Shia tradition broadly tends to recognize the coming of the [[Mahdi]] as signifying the coming punishment for non-believers.<ref name=":322">{{Cite book |last=Renard |first=John |title=Islamic Theological Themes: A Primary Source Reader |publisher=[[University of California Press]] |year=2014 |isbn=978-0-520-28189-9 |location=[[Oakland, California]] |pages=7–8}}</ref>

==Resurrection and final judgement==
{{Main|Judgement Day in Islam}}
[[File:Ibn arabi judgement day.svg|alt=|thumb|Diagram of ''Ard al-Hashr'' (the "Plain of Assembly") on the [[Day of Resurrection|Day of Judgement]], from an autograph manuscript of ''Futuhat al-Makkiyya'' written by the [[Sufism|Sufi mystic]] and [[Islamic philosophy|Muslim philosopher]]
[[Ibn Arabi]], ca. 1238. Shown are the ''ʿArsh'' ([[Throne of God]]), ''al-Aminun'' (pulpits for the righteous), seven rows of [[angel]]s, ''al-Ruh'' ([[Gabriel]]), ''A'raf'' (the Barrier), ''Ḥawḍ al-Kawthar'' (the [[Pond of Abundance]]), ''al-Maqam al-Mahmud'' (the Praiseworthy Station, where Muhammad will stand to intercede for the faithful), ''Mizan'' (the Scale), ''[[As-Sirāt]]'' (the Bridge), ''[[Jahannam]]'' (Hell), and ''[[Jannah|Marj al-Jannat]]'' (Meadow of Paradise).<ref>Begley, Wayne E. The Garden of the Taj Mahal: A Case Study of Mughal Architectural Planning and Symbolism, in: Wescoat, James L.; Wolschke-Bulmahn, Joachim (1996). ''[https://books.google.com/books?id=96ec98LieGsC Mughal Gardens: Sources, Places, Representations, and Prospects]'' Dumbarton Oaks, Washington D.C., {{ISBN|0884022358}}. pp. 229–231.</ref>]]
In Islam, "the promise and threat" (''waʿd wa-waʿīd'')<ref name="Taylor-1968-59">{{cite journal |last1=Taylor |first1=John B. |title=Some Aspects of Islamic Eschatology |journal=Religious Studies |date=October 1968 |volume=4 |issue=1 |page=59 |doi=10.1017/S0034412500003395 |s2cid=155073079 |url=http://www.jstor.com/stable/20000089 |access-date=2 May 2022|url-access=subscription }}</ref> of [[Judgement Day in Islam|Judgement Day]] ({{langx|ar|یوم القيامة|Yawm al-qiyāmah|Day of Resurrection}} or {{langx|ar|یوم الدین|italic=no| Yawm ad-din|Day of Judgement}}),
has been called "the dominant message" of the [[Quran]],{{#tag:ref| "as it is presented in the context" of monotheism|group="nb"}}<ref name=JISYYHIU1981:63>[[#JISYYHIU1981|Smith & Haddad, ''Islamic Understanding'',  1981]]: p.63</ref>
and is considered a fundamental tenet of faith by all Muslims, and one of [[the six articles of Islamic faith]]. The Day of Resurrection is mentioned frequently in the [[Quran]], especially in early Meccan Surahs, when all beings, including humans, animals, and [[jinn]], will be judged.<ref>Hasson, I. (2018). Last Judgment. In Encyclopaedia of the Qur'ān Online. Brill. https://doi.org/10.1163/1875-3922_q3_EQCOM_00105 </ref>

The two themes "central to the understanding of Islamic eschatology" are:
# the resurrection of bodies joined with spirits in a "reunion of whole, cognizant, and responsible persons", and
# a final judgement of the quality of each persons life "lived on earth and a subsequent recompense carried out with absolute justice through the prerogative of God's merciful will".<ref name=JISYYHIU1981:64>[[#JISYYHIU1981|Smith & Haddad, ''Islamic Understanding'',  1981]]: p.64</ref>

=== Resurrection theories ===
Although [[List of Muslim philosophers|Islamic philosophers]] and scholars were in general agreement on a bodily resurrection after death, interpretations differ in regard to the specifications of bodily resurrection. Only a few philosophers, such as [[Avicenna|Ibn Sina]], explicitly rejected bodily resurrection, arguing that true [[pleasure]] cannot be experienced through the body, and that returning to it at the time of the [[Greater Resurrection]] would be [[injustice|unjust]].<ref name="Lange-2016"/>{{rp|p=183-185}} The most prominent theories on the nature of bodily resurrection are  the following:
* The return to the same material body, someone had during lifetime, that will be restored.<ref>Joseph Hell ''Die Religion des Islam'' Motilal Banarsidass Publishers 1915 page 201</ref>
* Conjunction of the [[Ruh|soul]] with a ''[[Malakut|mithali]]'' body, which is congenial to the worlds of [[Barzakh]] and the [[Akhirah]].<ref>Zailan Moris ''Revelation, Intellectual Intuition and Reason in the Philosophy of Mulla Sadra: An Analysis of the al-hikmah al-'arshiyyah'' Routledge {{ISBN|978-1-136-85866-6}} page 107</ref>
* Resurrection with a Hurqaliyati body, accordingly a second invisible body, that survives death.<ref>Juan Cole ''Sacred Space And Holy War: The Politics, Culture and History of Shi'ite Islam'' I.B.Tauris 2002 {{ISBN|978-1-860-64736-9}} page 55</ref>

The trials, tribulations and details associated with it are detailed in the [[Quran]] and the [[hadith]] (sayings of [[Muhammad]]); these have been elaborated on in [[Aqidah|creed]]s, Quranic commentaries ([[Tafsir|tafsịr]]s), theological writing,<ref name=JISYYHIU1981:vii>[[#JISYYHIU1981|Smith & Haddad, ''Islamic Understanding'', 1981]]: p.vii</ref> eschatological manuals to provide more details and a sequence of events on the Day.<ref name=JISYYHIU1981:63/> Islamic expositors and scholarly authorities who have explained the subject in detail include [[al-Ghazali]], [[Ibn Kathir]], [[Ibn Majah]], [[Muhammad al-Bukhari]], and [[Ibn Khuzaymah]].

=== Lesser Resurrection ===
Small Resurrection (''al-qiyamah al-sughra'') happens, when the soul is separated from the body. The soul then turns to [[Islamic view of death|the afterlife]] (''akhira'' or ''malakut''), where it is interrogated by two angels, Munkar and Nakir.<ref>Nakamura, Kojiro. "Imām Ghazālī’s Cosmology Reconsidered with Special Reference to the Concept of ‘Jabarūt.’" Studia Islamica, no. 80, 1994, pp. 29–46. JSTOR, https://doi.org/10.2307/1595850. Accessed 12 Sep. 2022.</ref>

This grave period is known as the [[Barzakh]], similar to the [[Intermediate state (Christianity)|intermediate state]] in Christianity.

=== Greater Resurrection  ===
At [[divine judgement]], the resurrected will stand in a grand assembly, each person's ''Book of Deeds'' –  where "every small and great thing is recorded" – will be read,<ref>{{qref|54|52-53|b=y}}</ref> and ultimate judgement made.<ref name="auto">{{qref|74|38|b=y}}</ref><ref name="muhammad592">{{cite journal|title=Muslims' Eschatological Discourses on Colonialism in Northern Nigeria|journal=Journal of the American Academy of Religion|volume=67|issue=1|last=Muhammad|first=S. Umar|publisher=Oxford University Press|year=1999|pages=59–84|jstor=1466033|doi=10.1093/jaarel/67.1.59}}</ref> The resurrected will then walk over the bridge of [[As-Sirāt]], those judged worthy for the Garden continuing to their heavenly abode, those damned to The Fire, falling off the bridge into the pit of Jahannam.<ref name="WimEoQ2">"Reward and Punishment", ''Encyclopedia of the Qur'an''(2005)</ref> There will also be a punishment of the grave (for those who disbelieved) between death and the resurrection.<ref>Leor Halevi, [https://www.nytimes.com/2007/05/04/opinion/04iht-edhalevi.1.5565834.html].</ref>

Not everyone consigned to hell will remain there, as it is believed by both scholars and lay Muslims that "all but the ''[[kafir|mushrikun]]'', those who have committed the worst sin of impugning the ''[[tawḥīd]]'' of God, have the possibility of being saved;"<ref name=JISYYHIU1981:81>[[#JISYYHIU1981|Smith & Haddad, ''Islamic Understanding'',  1981]]: p.81</ref> and God's intercession to save sinners from hellfire is a "major theme" in popular Islamic stories about Judgement Day.<ref name=JISYYHIU1981:25>[[#JISYYHIU1981|Smith & Haddad, ''Islamic Understanding'',  1981]]: p.25</ref>

== Eschatological theological questions==
Scholars did not always agree on questions of who might go to hell; whether the creation of heaven and hell would wait until Judgement Day; whether there was a state between heaven and hell; whether those consigned to hell would be there for eternity.

===Basis of belief===
"Fear, hope, and finally ... faith", have been given (by Jane I. Smith, Yvonne Y. Haddad) as motivations offered by the Quran for the belief of Muslims in an Afterlife,<ref name=JISYYHIU1981:x>[[#JISYYHIU1981|Smith & Haddad, ''Islamic Understanding'',  1981]]: p.x</ref> although some ([[Abul A'la Maududi|Abū Aʿla al-Mawdūdī]]) have asserted it is simply a matter of reason:
<blockquote>The fact is that whatever Muhammad (peace be upon him) has told us about life after death is clearly borne out by reason. Although our belief in that Day is based upon our implicit trust in the Messenger of God, rational reflection not only confirms this belief but it also reveals that Muhammad's (peace be upon him) teachings in this respect are much more reasonable and understandable than all other view-points about life after death.<ref>Abū Aʿla al-Mawdūdī, ''Towards Understanding Islam'' (1960), p.130</ref></blockquote>

=== Early Muslim thought on damnation===
One of the primary beliefs pertaining to Islamic eschatology during the Early Muslim Period was that all humans could receive God's mercy and were worthy of salvation.<ref name="worldcat.org">{{Cite book|title=Locating Hell in Islamic traditions|editor=Lange, Christian|isbn=9789004301214|oclc=945783598|year = 2015|publisher=Brill }}</ref> These early depictions even show how small, insignificant deeds were enough to warrant mercy.<ref name=":03">{{Cite book |last=Arthur |first=Jeffery |title=Islam: Muhammad and his religion |date=1958 |publisher=Bobbs-Merrill |isbn=0672603489 |location=Indianapolis |oclc=846858}}</ref> Most early depictions of the end of days depict only those who reject ''Tawhid'', (the concept of monotheism), are subject to eternal punishment. However, everybody is held responsible for their actions. Concepts of reward and punishment were seen as beyond this world, a view that is also held today.<ref name=":03"/>

===Literal or allegorical===
According to scholars Jane I. Smith, Yvonne Y. Haddad,  "the vast majority of believers", understand verses of the Quran on Jannah (and hellfire) "to be real and specific, anticipating them" with joy or terror.<ref name=JISYYHIU1981:84>[[#JISYYHIU1981|Smith & Haddad, ''Islamic Understanding'',  1981]]: p.84</ref>

Besides the material notion of the paradise, descriptions of it are also interpreted as [[allegory|allegories]], whose meaning is the state of joy believers will experience in the afterlife. For some theologians, seeing God is not a question of sight, but of awareness of God's presence.<ref>Cyril Glassé, Huston Smith ''The New Encyclopedia of Islam'' Rowman Altamira 2003 {{ISBN|978-0-759-10190-6}} page 237</ref> Although early Sufis, such as [[Hallaj]], took the descriptions of paradise literal, later Sufi traditions usually stressed out the allegorical meaning.<ref>Jane Dammen McAuliffe ''Encyclopaedia of the Qurʾān'' Volume 2 Georgetown University, Washington DC p. 268</ref>

On the issue of Judgement Day, early Muslims debated whether scripture should be interpreted literally or figuratively, and the school of thought that prevailed ([[Ash'ari|Ashʿarī]]) "affirmed that such things as" connected with Judgement day as "the individual records of deeds (including the paper, pen, and ink with which they are inscribed), the bridge, the balance, and the pond" are "realities", and "to be understood in a concrete and literal sense."<ref name=JISYYHIU1981:65>[[#JISYYHIU1981|Smith & Haddad, ''Islamic Understanding'',  1981]]: p.65</ref>

===Modernist and postmodernist thought===

According to Smith and Haddad, "The great majority of contemporary Muslim writers, ... choose not to discuss the afterlife at all".<ref name="JISYYHIU1981:100" /> [[Islamic Modernist]]s, according to Smith and Haddad, express a "kind of embarrassment with the elaborate traditional detail concerning life in the grave and in the abodes of recompense, called into question by modern rationalists".<ref name=JISYYHIU1981:100>[[#JISYYHIU1981|Smith & Haddad, ''Islamic Understanding'',  1981]]: p.100</ref><ref name=Smith-Haddad-100>Smith/Haddad, ''Islamic Understanding'', 100, quoted in Christian Lange, p.19, [[#CLLHiIT2016|Lange, "Introducing Hell in Islamic Studies", 2016]]: p.19</ref><ref name="CLLHiIT2016:18">[[#CLLHiIT2016|Lange, "Introducing Hell in Islamic Studies", 2016]]: p.18</ref>   Consequently, most of "modern Muslim Theologians" either "silence the issue" or reaffirm "the traditional position that the reality of the afterlife must not be denied but that its exact nature remains unfathomable".<ref>quoting Lange describing Smith/Haddad, ''Islamic Understanding'', 100</ref><ref name=JISYYHIU1981:100/>

The beliefs of Pakistani modernist [[Muhammad Iqbal]] (died 1938), were similar to the Sufi "spiritual and internalized interpretations of hell" of [[Ibn Arabi|ibn ʿArabī]], and [[Rumi]], seeing paradise and hell "primarily as metaphors for inner psychic" developments. Thus "hellfire is actually a state of realization of one's failures as a human being", and not a supernatural subterranean realm.<ref>Iqbal, ''Reconstruction'', 98; quoted in [[#CLLHiIT2016|Lange, "Introducing Hell in Islamic Studies", 2016]]: p.20</ref> Egyptian modernist [[Muhammad Abduh|Muhammad ʿAbduh]], thought it was sufficient to believe in the existence of an afterlife with rewards and punishment to be a true believer, even if you ignored "clear" (''ẓāhir'') hadith about hell.<ref>ʿAbdūh,  Risālat al-tawḥīd, 178, quoted in [[#CLLHiIT2016|Lange, "Introducing Hell in Islamic Studies", 2016]]: p.20</ref>

====Gender equity====
Amina Wadud notes that the Qur'an does not mention any specific gender when talking about hell,  Q.{{qref|43|74–76}}, for example,  states that "the guilty are immortal in hell's torment"; and when discussing paradise, includes women, Q.{{qref|3|14–15}}, for example, states that "Beautiful of mankind is love of the joys (that come) from women and offspring..."<ref>{{Cite book|title=Qurʼan and woman: rereading the sacred text from a woman's perspective|last=Wadud, Amina|date=1999|publisher=Oxford University Press|isbn=9780198029434|edition= [2nd ed.]|location=New York|oclc=252662926}}</ref>

=== "Limbo" or ''al-aʿrāf'' in Islam ===
{{See also|Araf (Islam)}}
In terms of classical Islam, "the only options" afforded by the Qur'an for the resurrected are an eternity of horrible punishments of The Fire or the delightful rewards of The Garden.  Islamic tradition has raised the question of whether or not consignment to the Fire is eternal, or eternal for all, but "has found no reason to amend" the limit of two options in the afterlife.<ref name=JISYYHIU1981:90>[[#JISYYHIU1981|Smith & Haddad, ''Islamic Understanding'',  1981]]: p.90</ref> But one verse in the Quran has "led to a great deal of speculation concerning the possibility of a third place".<ref name=JISYYHIU1981:90/>
*There will be a barrier [''ḥijāb''] between paradise and hell. And on the heights [''al-aʿrāf''] of that barrier˺  will be people who will recognize ˹the residents of˺ both by their appearance. They will call out to the residents of paradise, "Peace be upon you!" They will have not yet entered paradise, but eagerly hope to (Q.{{qref|7|46}}).<ref name=JISYYHIU1981:90/>
"What some have called" the "Limbo" Theory of Islam, as described by Jane Smith and Yvonne Haddad, implies that some individuals are not immediately sent to The Fire or The Garden, but are held in a state of limbo.<ref name=JISYYHIU1981:90/>  Smith and Haddad believe it is "very doubtful" that the Qur'anic meant for ''al-aʿrāf'' to be understood as "an abode for those ... in an intermediate category, but this has come to be the most commonly held interpretation".<ref name=JISYYHIU1981:90-91>[[#JISYYHIU1981|Smith & Haddad, ''Islamic Understanding'',  1981]]: p.90-91</ref><ref>For Western analyses of this question see Richard Bell, "The Men on the A'raf," ''Muslim World'', 22 (1932), 43-48; Louis Gardet, ''Dieu'', pp. 330-34; Tor Andrae, ''Les Origins'', p. 85; Rudi Paret, "Al-A'raf," ''EI'' (New Ed.), I, pt. 1-10, pp, 603-04; Asin Palacios, ''Islam and the Divine Comedy'', pp. 81 ff.</ref>

As for who the inhabitants of the   inhabits ''al-aʿrāf'' are, the "majority of exegetes" support the theory that they are persons whose actions balance in terms of merit and demerit –  whose good deeds keep them from the Fire and whose evil deeds keep them from the Garden. They will be the last to enter the Garden, at the mercy of their Lord.<ref name=JISYYHIU1981:91>[[#JISYYHIU1981|Smith & Haddad, ''Islamic Understanding'',  1981]]: p.91</ref>

=== The concept of eternity ===
In Classical Islam, there was a consensus among the theological community regarding the finality of [[Jannah]] (also called Heaven, paradise, the Gardens); after Judgement Day, faithful servants of God would find themselves here for eternity.<ref name=":22">{{Cite book|title=The Islamic understanding of death and resurrection|last=Smith, Jane I.|date=1981|publisher=State University of New York Press|others=Haddad, Yvonne Yazbeck, 1935–|isbn=0873955064|location=Albany|pages=93|oclc=6666779}}</ref><ref name=JISYYHIU1981:93>[[#JISYYHIU1981|Smith & Haddad, ''Islamic Understanding'',  1981]]: p.93</ref> However, some practitioners in the early Muslim community held that the other abode of the hereafter (hell/Jahannam), or at least part of that abode, might not be eternal.<ref name=":22" /><ref name=JISYYHIU1981:93/> This belief was based upon an interpretations of scripture that since the upper, less tortuous levels of hell were reserved for Muslims who were only in hell  for as long as God deemed necessary. Once Muslims had their sins purged and were allowed into heaven, these levels would be empty and the need for their existence gone.<ref name=":22" /><ref name=JISYYHIU1981:93/> These interpretations are centered on verses 11:106–107 in the Quran, stating,
:"As for those who are wretched, they shall be in the Fire, wherein there shall be for them groaning and wailing, abiding therein for so long as the heavens and the earth endure, save as thy Lord wills. Surely thy Lord does whatsoever He wills".<ref>{{Cite book|title=The study Quran: a new translation and commentary|editor1=Nasr, Seyyed Hossein |editor2=Dagli, Caner K. |editor3=Dakake, Maria Massi |editor4=Lumbard, Joseph E. B. |editor5=Rustom, Mohammed |isbn=9780061125867|edition= First|location=New York, NY|pages=585|oclc=879553018|date = 17 November 2015}}</ref>
This possibility  that God may yet commute a sentence to hell, interprets (parts of) hell as being similar in function to  purgatory in Christianity, with the exception to this comparison being that hell in this context is for the punishment of the sinner's complete body, as opposed to only the soul being punished in purgatory.<ref name=":22" /><ref name=JISYYHIU1981:93/> Arguments questioning the permanence of hell take the view that hell is not necessarily solely there to punish the evil, but to purify their souls, whereas the purpose of the Garden is simply to reward the righteous.<ref>{{Cite book|title=The Islamic understanding of death and resurrection|last=Smith, Jane I.|date=1981|publisher=State University of New York Press|others=Haddad, Yvonne Yazbeck, 1935–|isbn=0873955064|location=Albany|pages=94|oclc=6666779}}</ref><ref name=JISYYHIU1981:94>[[#JISYYHIU1981|Smith & Haddad, ''Islamic Understanding'',  1981]]: p.94</ref>
Evidence against the concept of hell being in part temporary, is the Quran verse stating that hell will endure as long as Heaven will, which has been established as eternal.<ref name="Shamoun-forever">{{cite web |last1=Shamoun |first1=Sam |last2=Katz |first2=Jochen |title=Quran Contradiction. Will people stay in Hell forever, or not? |url=http://64.71.77.248/answering_islam/quran/contra/hell_forever.html |website=China's Christian Library |access-date=14 June 2022}}</ref>

===Predestination===
{{main|Predestination in Islam}}
Orthodox Islam teaches the doctrine of ''Qadar'' ({{langx|ar|قدر}}, aka [[Predestination]], or [[Divinity|divine]] [[destiny]] in [[Islam]]),<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.missionislam.com/knowledge/Qadar.htm|title=Qadar|work=missionislam.com|access-date=2016-03-27}}</ref> whereby everything that has happened and will happen in the universe—including sinful human behavior—is commanded by God.<ref name=AGI1978:132>[[#AGI1978|Guillaume, ''Islam'', 1978]]: p.132</ref> At the same time, we human beings are responsible for our actions and rewarded or punished for them in the [[Afterlife]].<ref name="Parrott-RtDDaFWiI-2017">{{cite web |last1=Parrott |first1=Justin |title=Reconciling the Divine Decree and Free Will in Islam |url=https://yaqeeninstitute.org/read/paper/reconciling-the-divine-decree-and-free-will-in-islam |website=Yaqeen Institute |access-date=16 June 2022 |date=31 July 2017}}</ref><ref name="account 96978">{{cite web |title=If things are decreed, then how can a person be called to account for them? 96978 |url=https://islamqa.info/en/answers/96978/if-things-are-decreed-then-how-can-a-person-be-called-to-account-for-them |website=Islam Question and Answer |access-date=26 June 2022 |date=29 April 2007}}</ref>

''Qadar''/predestination/divine destiny, is one of Sunni Islam's [[Iman (concept)#The Six Articles of Faith|six articles of faith]] and is mentioned in the Quran.
*"Nothing will ever befall us except what Allah has destined for us" (Q.{{qref|9|51}}).<ref name=iWWINaM1995:124/>
*"Allah leaves whoever He wills to stray and guides whoever He wills." (Q.{{qref|14|4}}).<ref name=iWWINaM1995:124>[[#iWWINaM1995|Ibn Warraq, ''Why I Am Not a Muslim'',  1995]]: p.124</ref>
Of course, the fate of human beings in the Afterlife is especially crucial. It is reflected in Quranic verses such as
* Had We willed, We could have easily imposed guidance on every soul. But My Word will come to pass: I will surely fill up Hell with jinn and humans all together. (Q.{{qref|32|13}}).<ref name=iWWINaM1995:124/>

Muhammad also talked about the doctrine of predestination multiple times during his mission.<ref name=":03" />  Thus the consensus of the Sunni Muslim community has been that scripture indicates predestination.<ref name=":03" />
Nonetheless, some Muslim theologians have argued against predestination, (including at least some Shia Muslims, whose [[Twelver theology#Articles of faith|article of faith]]  includes ''Adalah'' (justice), but not ''Qadar''. At least some Shia –  such as [[Naser Makarem Shirazi]] –  denounce predestination).<ref name="Shirazi-justice">{{cite book |last1=Shirazi |first1=Naser Makarem |title=The Justice of God |publisher=Al-Islam.org |url=https://www.al-islam.org/justice-god-naser-makarem-shirazi/issue-predestination-and-free-will |access-date=14 June 2022 |chapter=The Issue of Predestination and Free Will|date=12 May 2015 }}</ref>

Opponents of predestination in early Islam, (''al-[[Qadariyah]]'', ''[[Muʿtazila]]'') argued that if God has already determined everything that will happen, God's human creation cannot really have free will over decisions to do good or evil, or control of whether they suffer eternal torment in [[Jahannam]]—which is something that (the opponents believe) a just God would never allow to happen.<ref name=iWWINaM1995:124/>
While ''Qadar'' is the consensus of Muslims, it is also an issue scholars discourage debate and discussion about. Hadith narrate Muhammad  warning his followers to "refrain from speaking about ''qadar''";<ref name="De Cillis-2018">{{cite journal |last1=De Cillis |first1=Maria |title=ISLAM. Muslims and Free Will |journal=Oasis |date=22 April 2022 |volume=6 |url=https://www.oasiscenter.eu/en/muslims-and-free-will |access-date=16 June 2022}}</ref> and according to the creed of [[Al-Tahawi]], "the principle of providence" is such a secret that God did not let even angels, prophets and messengers in on the mystery.<ref name="Parrott-RtDDaFWiI-2017"/><ref>{{cite web |title=Is that a Muslim can believe in predestination, if so why judge Muslims? Answered according to Hanafi Fiqh by Tafseer Raheemi |url=https://islamqa.org/hanafi/tafseer-raheemi/51573/is-that-a-muslim-can-believe-in-predestination-if-so-why-judge-muslims/ |website=IslamQA.org |date=13 October 2012 |access-date=5 February 2022}}</ref>

=== Who will enter heaven or hell===
Scholars do not all agree on who will end up in Jannah and who in Jahannam, and the criteria for deciding. Issues include whether all Muslims, even those who've committed major sins, will end up in Jannah; whether any non-Muslims will be saved or all will go to Jahannam.

According to the Quran, the basic criterion for [[salvation]] in the [[afterlife]] is the belief in the [[Monotheism|oneness of God]] ([[Tawhid|{{transliteration|ar|ALA|tawḥīd}}]]), [[Angels in Islam|angels]], [[Revelation#Islam|revealed books]], [[Prophets and messengers in Islam|messengers]], as well as [[Repentance in Islam|repentance]] to God, and doing good deeds (''amal salih'').<ref name="RoadtoParadise">{{cite book|author1-last=Günther |author1-first=Sebastian|author2-last= Lawson |author2-first= Todd |year=2017 |title=Roads to Paradise: Eschatology and Concepts of the Hereafter in Islam (2 vols.): Volume 1: Foundations and Formation of a Tradition. Reflections on the Hereafter in the Quran and Islamic Religious Thought / Volume 2: Continuity and Change. The Plurality of Eschatological Representations in the Islamicate World |publisher=[[Brill Publishers]] |doi=10.1163/1875-9831_isla_COM_0300 |isbn=978-9-004-33315-4| url= https://books.google.com/books?id=5_MoDgAAQBAJ}}</ref>{{rp|p=51}} This is qualified by the doctrine that ultimately salvation can only be attained through God's judgement.<ref name="mo">Moiz Amjad. "[http://renaissance.com.pk/juntitl2y1.html Will Christians enter Paradise or go to Hell?] {{webarchive |url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070927210056/http://renaissance.com.pk/juntitl2y1.html |date=2007-09-27 }}". ''[[Al-Mawrid|Renaissance - Monthly Islamic journal]]'' 11(6), June, 2001.</ref>

Muslim scholars mostly agree that ultimately all Muslims will be saved (though many may need to be purified by a spell in hellfire<ref name=CLPaHiIT2016:40>[[#CLPaHiIT2016|Lange, ''Paradise and Hell in Islamic Traditions'',  2016]]: p.40</ref> but disagree about the possibility for  salvation of non-Muslims.

The idea that [[jinn]] as well as humans could find salvation was widely accepted,<ref name=CLPaHiIT2016:140-1>[[#CLPaHiIT2016|Lange, ''Paradise and Hell in Islamic Traditions'',  2016]]: p.140-1</ref><ref>el-Zein, Amira (2009). Islam, Arabs, and Intelligent World of the Jinn. Syracuse, NY: Syracuse University Press. ISBN 978-0-8156-5070-6. p. 20</ref> Like humans, their destiny in the hereafter depends on whether they accept God's guidance. The surah Al-Jinn says:
:And among us are those who have submitted ˹to Allah˺ and those who are deviant. So ˹as for˺ those who submitted, it is they who have attained Right Guidance. And as for the deviant, they will be fuel for Hell.’" (Q.{{qref|72|14-15}})
Angels, who are not subject to desire and do not commit sin, are found in paradise.<ref name=CLPaHiIT2016:141>[[#CLPaHiIT2016|Lange, ''Paradise and Hell in Islamic Traditions'',  2016]]: p.141</ref> The devils cannot return to paradise, because Islamic scripture states that their father, the fallen angel Iblis, was banished, but never suggests that he or his offspring were forgiven or promised to return.<ref name="Lange-2016"/>{{rp|p=46}}<ref>el-Zein, Amira (2009). Islam, Arabs, and Intelligent World of the Jinn. Syracuse, NY: Syracuse University Press. ISBN 978-0-8156-5070-6.</ref>

====Scholars====
Muslim scholars arguing in favor of  non-Muslims' being able to enter paradise cite the verse:
*"Indeed, those who believed and those who were Jews or Christians or Sabians—those who believed in Allah and the Last Day and did righteousness—will have their reward with their Lord, and no fear will there be concerning them, nor will they grieve," (Q.{{qref|2|62}}).
Those arguing against non-Muslim salvation regard this verse to have applied only until the arrival of [[Muhammad]], after which it was [[Naskh (tafsir)|abrogated]]  by another verse:
* "And whoever desires other than Islam as religion—never will it be accepted from him, and he, in the Hereafter, will be among the losers. (Q.{{qref|3|85}}).<ref>David Marshall ''Communicating the Word: Revelation, Translation, and Interpretation in Christianity and Islam'' Georgetown University Press 2011 {{ISBN|978-1-589-01803-7}} p. 8</ref><ref>Lloyd Ridgeon ''Islamic Interpretations of Christianity'' Routledge 2013 {{ISBN|978-1-136-84020-3}}</ref><ref name="Khalil-2013-209">{{Cite book|title=Between heaven and hell: Islam, salvation, and the fate of others|date=2013|publisher=Oxford University Press|editor=Khalil, Mohammad Hassan|isbn=9780199945412|location=Oxford|page=113|oclc=793726652}}</ref><ref name=Khalil-2013-111>{{Cite book|title=Between heaven and hell: Islam, salvation, and the fate of others|date=2013|publisher=Oxford University Press|editor=Khalil, Mohammad Hassan|isbn=9780199945412|location=Oxford|page=111|oclc=793726652}}</ref>
Although the Quran acknowledges the Bible as gospel, rejecting Muhammad and his message is seen as a rejection of salvation by them.<ref name="Khalil-2013-209" />

According to [[Mohammad Hassan Khalil]], on the subject of whether self-proclaimed non-Muslims might be allowed into Jannah, Islamic theologians can be classified as
*'Exclusivists' –  who maintain that only Muslims will be saved and that adherents of all other beliefs will burn in hell.<ref name="Firestone"/>
*'Inclusivists' –  who also affirm that Islam is the path to heaven, but that some others are actually on the same path (and will go to Jannah) though they call themselves non-Muslims and call their path by a different name.<ref name="Firestone"/>
* 'Pluralists' –  assert that there are several religious traditions or interpretations that are equally effective saving their adherents from damnation,  regardless of the circumstances.<ref name="Firestone"/>
* 'Universalists' –  'believe that all of hell's inhabitants will be admitted into heaven following a significant period of time' suffering in hell.<ref name="Firestone"/>
(In addition there are those who could be described as 'interim inclusivists' or <ref name="Firestone"/> 'ultimate universalists'.)<ref name=Khalil-2013-13>{{Cite book|title=Between heaven and hell: Islam, salvation, and the fate of others|date=2013|publisher=Oxford University Press|editor=Khalil, Mohammad Hassan|isbn=9780199945412|location=Oxford|page=13|oclc=793726652}}</ref>

Based on these categories, four "well-known and particularly influential Muslim thinkers" can be sorted as:
* al-Ghazālī –  "optimistic" or "liberal inclusivist",<ref name="Firestone"/>
* [[Ibn Arabi|Ibn al-ʿArabī]] –  "liberal inclusivist" to "quasi-universalist",<ref name="Firestone"/>
* [[Ibn Taymiyya]] and
* [[Ibn Qayyim al-Jawziyya]] –  both universalists, (despite their status as "darlings" of "many who call themselves Salafīs"),
* [[Rashīd Riḍā]] –  was a lenient inclusivist to cautious universalist.<ref name="Firestone">{{cite journal |last1=Firestone |first1=Reuven |title=[Review of two books by Mohammad Hassan Khalil, ''Islam and the Fate of Others'' and ''Between Heaven and Hell''] |journal=Journal of Qur'anic Studies |date=June 2014 |volume=16 |issue=2 |pages=142–149 |doi=10.3366/jqs.2014.0151 |url=https://www.euppublishing.com/doi/full/10.3366/jqs.2014.0151 |access-date=4 May 2022|url-access=subscription }}</ref>
* [[Ibn Hazm]] –  "proclaimed that even the most upright and flawless moral-ethical monotheist is damned to hell if he knows anything about a person named Muḥammad or a religion called Islam and does not join, while even the most brutal and immoral person who converts sincerely to Islam the moment before he dies, is saved". Furthermore, "any Muslim who does not agree is not a Muslim himself."<ref name="Firestone"/>

==== Ash'arism ====
{{further|Ash'ari}}
Ashʿarism (/æʃəˈriː/; Arabic: أشعرية: al-ʾAshʿarīyah), one of the main [[Sunni Islam|Sunni]] [[schools of Islamic theology]], founded by the [[Islamic scholar]], [[Shafiʽi school|Shāfiʿī]] [[Faqīh|jurist]], [[Al-Ash'ari|Abū al-Ḥasan al-Ashʿarī]] in the 10th century,<ref name="Islamica 2015">{{cite encyclopedia |author-last=Javad Anvari |author-first=Mohammad |year=2015 |title=al-Ashʿarī |translator-last=Melvin-Koushki |translator-first=Matthew |editor1-last=Madelung |editor1-first=Wilferd |editor2-last=Daftary |editor2-first=Farhad |encyclopedia=Encyclopaedia Islamica |location=[[Leiden]] and [[Boston]] |publisher=[[Brill Publishers]] |doi=10.1163/1875-9831_isla_COM_0300 |issn=1875-9823}}</ref> is known for an optimistic perspective on salvation for Muslims, repeatedly addressing God's mercy over God's wrath.<ref name="IslamicLaw">{{cite book|author1-last=Reinhart|author1-first=Kevin|author2-last=Gleave|author2-first=Robert|year=2014|chapter=Sins, expiation, and non-rationality in fiqh|chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=tYyfAwAAQBA|editor-last=Lange|editor-first=Christian|editor-link=Christian Lange (Religious studies)|title=Islamic Law in Theory: Studies on Jurisprudence in Honor of Bernard Weiss|publisher=[[Brill Publishers]]|isbn=9780567081612}}{{Dead link|date=September 2024 |bot=InternetArchiveBot |fix-attempted=yes }}</ref>{{rp|p=165}}<ref name=CLPaHiIT2016:177-78/> However,  according to Ash'arism, God is neither obligated to punish disobedience nor to reward obedience.<ref name="IslamicLaw"/>{{rp|p=167}}

Ash'aris hold revelation necessary to understand good and evil, as well as religious truths.<ref name="Rationalistic"/>{{rp|p=109}} Accordingly, revelation is necessary to reach moral and religious truths and thus, people who hear from a prophet or messenger are obligated to follow the revealed religion. However, those who have not received revelation are not obligated, and can hope for salvation.<ref name="Pluralism"/>{{rp|p=215}}

Ash'arite scholar [[al-Ghazali]] divided non-Muslims into three categories for purposes of the Afterlife according to [[Mohammad Hassan Khalil]]:<ref name="Diversity">{{cite book |author1-last=McKim |author1-first=Robert| year=2016 |orig-date= |chapter= Pluralism in Jewish, Christian and Muslim thought|chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=BoByDQAAQBAJ |editor-last=|editor-first=|editor-link= |title=Religious Perspectives on Religious Diversity |location= |publisher=[[Brill Publishers]] |pages=|doi= |isbn=9789004330436|lccn=}}</ref><ref name=Khalil-2013-111/>

#Those who never heard the message of Islam, who live in far away lands, such as the Byzantines ("Romans"). These will be forgiven.
#Those who were only exposed to a distorted understanding of Islam and had no opportunity to hear the correct version. These too will be forgiven.
#People who heard of Islam because they lived in neighboring lands and/or mixed with Muslims. These have no hope of salvation.<ref name=Khalil-2013-111/>
Of these three, only the last group would be punished.<ref name="Diversity"/>
[[Al-Ghazali|Ghazali]] distinguished between the "saved" and "those who will attain success". Therefore, righteous non-Muslims will neither enter hell nor Jannah, but will stay in [[Araf (Islam)|al-Araf]] (a realm between Jannah and Jahannam  inhabited by those who are neither entirely evil nor entirely good).<ref name=MHIatFoO2012-45-6>{{cite book|first1=Mohammad Hassan |last1=Khalil |title=Islam and the Fate of Others: The Salvation Question |publisher= Oxford University Press |location= USA |date=2012 |isbn=978-0-199-79666-3 |pages=45–46}}</ref>

==== Maturidism ====
{{further|Maturidi}}
Māturīdism ({{langx|ar|الماتريدية}}: ''al-Māturīdiyyah'') is also one of the main [[Sunni Islam|Sunni]] [[schools of Islamic theology]]<ref name="Rudolph 2016">{{cite book |author-last=Rudolph |author-first=Ulrich |year=2016 |orig-date=2014 |chapter=Part I: Islamic Theologies during the Formative and the Early Middle period – Ḥanafī Theological Tradition and Māturīdism |chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=70wnDAAAQBAJ&pg=PA280 |editor-last=Schmidtke |editor-first=Sabine |editor-link=Sabine Schmidtke |title=The Oxford Handbook of Islamic Theology |location=[[Oxford]] and [[New York City|New York]] |publisher=[[Oxford University Press]] |pages=280–296 |doi=10.1093/oxfordhb/9780199696703.013.023 |isbn=9780199696703 |lccn=2016935488}}</ref> developed and formalized by the [[Islamic scholar]], [[Hanafi|Ḥanafī]] [[Faqīh|jurist]] [[Abu Mansur al-Maturidi|Abū Manṣūr al-Māturīdī]] in the 10th century.<ref name="Rudolph 2016"/> Māturīdi scholars are thought to have been less optimistic about the chances of sinners entering paradise than Ash'aris,  but more optimistic than Muʿtazila.<ref name=CLPaHiIT2016:177-78/>  They agree that Muslims who have committed grave sins will be punished but generally acknowledge that even these people will eventually enter paradise.<ref name="Lange-2016"/>{{rp|p=177}}<ref name=CLPaHiIT2016:177>[[#CLPaHiIT2016|Lange, ''Paradise and Hell in Islamic Traditions'',  2016]]: p.177</ref> Regarding the fate of non-Muslims, scholars have different opinions.<ref name="Rationalistic">{{cite book |author1-last=Isaacs|author1-first=Rico|author2-last=Frigerio|author2-first=Alessandro |year=2018 |orig-date=|chapter= Pluralism in Jewish, Christian and Muslim thought|chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=VSt1DwAAQBAJ&dq=maturidi+salvation&pg=PA110 |editor-last= |editor-first= |editor-link= |title=Theorizing Central Asian Politics: The State, Ideology and Power |location= |publisher=[[Springer International Publishing]] |pages= |doi= |isbn=9783319973555|lccn=}}</ref>{{rp|p=110}} Māturīdism holds people responsible for believing in a [[Creator deity|creator]] due to their intellectual capacities, even if they haven't heard about any prophetic mission.<ref name="Zhussipbek">"Zhussipbek, Galym, and Bakhytzhan Satershinov. "Search for the theological grounds to develop inclusive Islamic interpretations: Some insights from rationalistic Islamic Maturidite theology." Religions 10.11 (2019): 609.</ref>{{rp|p=5}}<ref name="Pluralism">{{cite book |author1-last=Solomon |author1-first=Norman |author2-last=Harries |author2-first=Richard |year=2014 |orig-date= |chapter= Pluralism in Jewish, Christian and Muslim thought|chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=wQfUAwAAQBAJ |editor-last=|editor-first=|editor-link= |title=Abraham's Children: Jews, Christians and Muslims in Conversation |location= |publisher=[[Bloomsbury Academic]] |pages=|doi= |isbn=9780567081612 |lccn=0567081613}}</ref>{{rp|p=215}}<ref name="Rationalistic"/>{{rp|p=110}} While some (like [[Rifat Atay]]) regard Māturīdism to be exclusivistic, only allowing people who are Muslims to enter paradise,<ref name="Rationalistic"/>{{rp|p=110}} others argue that Māturīdi understood that "to believe in Islam" meant having a subjective conceptualization of God and his laws by reason alone. This fits the doctrine, upheld by Māturīdism, that human reason suffices to grasp good and evil, and arrive at religious truths.<ref name="Rationalistic"/>{{rp|p=109}} Accordingly, people are judged by their degree of understanding God's universal law, not by their adherence to a particular belief system.<ref name="Pluralism"/>{{rp|p=215}}<ref name="Rationalistic"/>{{rp|p=110}} In modern times, [[Yohei Matsuyama]] largely agrees with this interpretation.<ref name="Zhussipbek"/>{{rp|p=5}} According to Abu'l-Qasim Ishaq, children cannot be considered unbelievers, thus all of them go to paradise.<ref>Tritton, A. S. "An Early Work from the School of Al-Māturīdī." Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain and Ireland, no. 3/4, Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain and Ireland, 1966, pp. 96–99, http://www.jstor.org/stable/25202926.</ref>

==== Muʿtazila ====
{{further|Muʿtazila}}
[[Muʿtazila]] ({{langx|ar|المعتزلة}} ''{{transliteration|ar|DIN|al-muʿtazilah}}'') emphasized God's justice, [[free will]], and the responsibility of each human being  for their actions. They have been called the  "best known exponents" of ''[[Qadariyah]]'', the idea that human free will was necessary "as a guarantee of divine justice".<ref name=JISYYHIU1981:22>[[#JISYYHIU1981|Smith & Haddad, ''Islamic Understanding'',  1981]]: p.22</ref> Compared to Maturidi and Ashʿarī, Muʿtazila had the least amount of "salvific optimism".<ref name=CLPaHiIT2016:177-78>[[#CLPaHiIT2016|Lange, ''Paradise and Hell in Islamic Traditions'',  2016]]: p.177-78</ref>
The "divine threat" (''al-wa'id'') and "divine promise" (''al wa'd'') became key tenets of the Mu'tazilites,<ref name="Lange-2016"/>{{rp|p=173}} who  stressed that they applied to both Muslims and non-Muslims. This meant that those who committed grave or heinous  sins ([[Islamic views on sin#Major sins: Al-Kaba'ir|Kabirah]]), even  Muslims, might denied entry to paradise forever.<ref name="Lange-2016"/>{{rp|p=173}} The only way for a grave sinner to be forgiven, many theologians believed, is by [[Tawba|repentance]] (''tawba''). Mu'tazilites believed God's justice obligated Him to forgive those who had repented (other schools believed He was not so constrained).<ref name="Lange-2016"/>{{rp|p=175}} The Mu'tazilites stress on individual accountability meant a rejection of  [[Shafa'a|intercession]] (''Shafa'a'') on behalf of Muhammad.<ref name="Lange-2016"/>{{rp|p=178}} Another controversial belief of many (but not all)<ref name="Lange-2016"/>{{rp|p=168}} Mu'tazilites was that  paradise and hell would be created only after Judgement Day. This meant rejection of the commonly accepted idea that paradise and hell coexist with the contemporary world. Their reasoning was that since God does everything for a purpose, and since paradise and hell are created to reward or punish people, they will only be created after judgement has been passed on people and they are assigned to these abodes.<ref name="Lange-2016"/>{{rp|p=167–168}}

====Twelver Shia====
{{further|Twelver Shi'ism}}
Like most Sunni, Shia Islam hold that all Muslims will eventually go to Jannah.{{#tag:ref|Sayyed Mohammad Al-Musawi quotes
*Shaikh al-Mufeed: The Imami (Shia) scholars are unanimous that remaining in hellfire for ever is for the Kuffaar only and not for the major sinners from those who believe in Allah.<ref>''Awaa'il al-Maqaalaat'' by Shaikh al-Mufeed, p.14</ref><ref name="every Muslim-2020">{{cite web |last1=Al-Musawi |first1=Sayyed Mohammad |title=Is it a Shi'i belief that every Muslim, including people like Umar ibn Sa'd and Ibn Ziyad, will eventually enter paradise after being punished for their sins? Is there any Islamic sect that has such a belief? |url=https://www.al-islam.org/ask/is-it-a-shii-belief-that-every-muslim-including-people-like-umar-ibn-sad-and-ibn-ziyad-will-eventually-enter-paradise-after-being-punished-for-their-sins-is-there-any-islamic-sect-that-has-such-a-belief/sayyed-mohammad-al-musawi |website=al-Islam.org |access-date=4 May 2022 |date=2020}}</ref>
*Shaikh al-Sadouq: The Hellfire is the place of those who did not believe in Allah and some of the believers in Allah who committed major sins but they will not remain in it. No one will remain in Hellfire for ever but the non believers.<ref>''Sharh Aqaed al-Sadouq'', Shaikh al-Sadouq p.55</ref><ref name="every Muslim-2020"/>|group="nb"}}

On the fate of non-Muslims in the hereafter, Shia Islam (or at least cleric Ayatullah Mahdi Hadavi Tehrani of Al-Islam.org), takes a view similar to Ash'arism. Tehrani divides non-Muslims into two groups: the heedless and stubborn who will go to hell and the ignorant who will not "if they are truthful to their own religion": <blockquote>
#Those who are termed 'Jahil-e-Muqassir' (lit. 'culpable ignorant' –  ''jahil'' suggesting unbelief rather than literal ignorance). These are non-believers to whom the message of Islam has reached and who have understood its truthfulness. However, they are not prepared to accept the truth due to their obstinacy and stubbornness. This group deserves to be punished in hell.
#Those who are termed 'Jahil-e-Qasir' (lit. 'inculpable ignorant'). These are non-believers to whom the message of Islam has not reached, or it has been presented to them in a very incomplete and untruthful manner. Such people will attain salvation if they are truthful to their own religion.<ref name="Tehrani-13">{{cite book |last1=Tehrani |first1=Ayatullah Mahdi Hadavi |title=Faith and Reason |publisher=Al-Islam.org |url=https://www.al-islam.org/faith-and-reason/question-13-non-muslims-and-hell |access-date=25 April 2022 |chapter=Question 20: Heaven and Hell|date=5 September 2012 }}</ref>
</blockquote>
(At least one [[Twelver Shia]] scholar 'Allama al-Hilli, insists that not only will non-Muslims be damned but suggests Sunni Muslim will be as well, as it is not possible for any Muslim to be ignorant of "the imamate and of the Return", and thus "whoever is ignorant of any of them is outside the circle of believers and worthy of eternal punishment."<ref name=":32">{{Cite book |last=Renard |first=John |title=Islamic Theological Themes: A Primary Source Reader |publisher=University of California Press |year=2014 |isbn=978-0-520-28189-9 |location=Oakland, California |pages=7–8}}</ref> This statement is not indicative of all Shia eschatological thought.)

Also like mainstream schools, and unlike Muʿtazila, Twelver Shia hold that Jannah and hellfire "exist at present ... according to the Qur`an and ahadith". However, they will not "become fully apparent and represented" until Judgement Day.<ref name="Tehrani-20">{{cite book |last1=Tehrani |first1=Ayatullah Mahdi Hadavi |title=Faith and Reason |publisher=Al-Islam.org |url=https://www.al-islam.org/faith-and-reason/question-20-heaven-and-hell |access-date=25 April 2022 |chapter=Question 13: Non-muslims and Hell|date=5 September 2012 }}</ref> As for three other issues in Islamic eschatology:
*the differences between Adam and Eve's [[Garden of Eden]],
*"the heaven or hell of one's actions which envelopes a person"; and
*the ''[[Barzakh#Interpretations|Barzakh]]'' state of "purgatory" in Islam after death and before Resurrection; in Shia Islam,
these three "types" of jannah (or Jahannam) are "all simply manifestations of the ultimate, eternal heaven and hell".<ref name="Tehrani-20"/>

==== Islamic Modernism and Salafism ====
[[Islamic Modernism|Modernist scholars]] [[Muhammad Abduh]] and [[Rashid Rida]] rejected the notion that the [[People of the Book]] would be excluded from Jannah, based on Q.{{qref|4|123-124}} (see above).<ref name="koran-khoury">Der Koran, ed. and transl. by [[Adel Theodor Khoury]], Gütersloh 2004, p. 67 (footnote).</ref>  The [[Fate of the unlearned]] is also a matter of dispute within Islamic theology. Like many [[Modernity|modern]] scholars advocated, including [[Mawlana Ali]], [[Ismail Hakki Izmirli]], and [[Yusuf al-Qaradawi]], Muhammad Abduh and Rashid Rida asserted the doctrine of a finite hell ''fanāʾ al-nār'' ("demise of hell").<ref name="Lange-2016"/>{{rp|p=284}}

Turkish theologian [[Süleyman Ateş]] cites the Quran {{qref|5|66}} to argue that there are good and bad people in any religion, and that some Muslims may not enter paradise, but those who believe without doubt in the hereafter and a God without partners,  and who do good and useful deeds may enter paradise, whatever their religions.<ref>[[Şinasi Gündüz]], Cafer S. Yaran ''Change and Essence: Dialectical Relations Between Change and Continuity in the Turkish Intellectual Tradition'' CRVP 2005 {{ISBN|978-1-565-18222-6}} p. 9</ref>

[[Salafism|Neo-Salafi trends]] commonly reject inclusive salvation theories. [[Umar Sulaiman Al-Ashqar]], an eminent Salafi scholar, can serve to illustrate the core points of Salafi beliefs.<ref name="Lange-2016"/>{{rp|p=284}} Like proto-Salafi [[ibn Qayyim]], he rejects the doctrine of ''fanāʾ al-nār''.<ref name="Lange-2016"/>{{rp|p=284}} He interpretes a hadith that there are 73 three Islamic sects from which only one is saved in accordance with his own sectarian beliefs.<ref name="Lange-2016"/>{{rp|p=284}} Only those who stick close to the Quran and the Sunnah go to paradise, while those he consider slightly deviant, such as Mu'tzilites and Kharijites go to hell temporarily, while "extreme" groups such as [[Isma'ilism|Isma'ilis]], [[Alevism|Alevites]], and [[Druze]], go to hell forever.<ref name="Lange-2016"/>{{rp|p=284}} Al-Ashqar elaborates on a hadith that "most inhabitants of hell are women" that women are more likely to go to hell due to intellectual deficiencies. He adds, despite their flaws, there are also many good and pious women.<ref name="Lange-2016"/>{{rp|p=285}} Similar, most Salafi authors reiterate works produced in the premodern period, but add personal preferences adjusting them to comply to their moral and sectarian convictions.<ref name="Lange-2016"/>{{rp|p=285}}

==Islamic eschatology in the 20th and 21st centuries==
Prior to the 20th century, Islam had "strongly emphasized the hereafter" (''ākhira'').  Desire to counter colonialism and "achieve material and technological parity with the West" turned  modern thinkers to stress this world (''dunyā''), without suggesting ''ākhira'' was less important.<ref name=JISYYHIU1981:100/>
The focus on end times/[[Eschatology]] in Islam has tended to occur among those less exposed to scholarly learning. In the 1980s however, it again became much more popular generally.  Islamic leaders and scholars have always urged Muslim to be prepared for Judgement Day, but "the particulars of the end of the world are not a mainstream concern in Islam," according to Graeme Wood.<ref name=GWWotS2016:250>[[#GWWotS2016|Wood, ''The Way of the Strangers'', 2016]]: p.250</ref>{{#tag:ref|Smith and Haddad write, the "great majority of contemporary Muslim writers, ... choose not to discuss the afterlife at all. They are satisfied with simply affirming the reality of the day of judgment and human accountability without providing any details or interpretive discussion.<ref name=JISYYHIU1981:100/>|group="nb"}}

However, in 2012 poll conducted by the [[Pew Research Center]] found that 50% or more respondents in several [[Muslim-majority countries]] ([[Lebanon]], Turkey, Malaysia, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iraq, [[Tunisia]], [[Algeria]], and [[Morocco]]) expected the [[Mahdi]] (the final redeemer according to Islam)<ref name="EI2">{{cite encyclopedia |author-last=Madelung |author-first=Wilferd |author-link=Wilferd Madelung |year=1986 |title=al-Mahdī |editor1-last=Bosworth |editor1-first=C. E. |editor1-link=Clifford Edmund Bosworth |editor2-last=van Donzel |editor2-first=E. J. |editor2-link=Emeri Johannes van Donzel |editor3-last=Heinrichs |editor3-first=W. P. |editor3-link=Wolfhart Heinrichs |editor4-last=Lewis |editor4-first=B. |editor5-last=Pellat |editor5-first=Ch. |editor5-link=Charles Pellat |encyclopedia=[[Encyclopaedia of Islam#2nd edition, EI2|Encyclopaedia of Islam, Second Edition]] |location=[[Leiden]] |publisher=[[Brill Publishers]] |volume=5 |doi=10.1163/1573-3912_islam_COM_0618 |isbn=978-90-04-16121-4}}</ref> to return during their lifetime.<ref name="pew-Muslims-2012">{{cite web |date=9 August 2012 |title=The World's Muslims: Unity and Diversity. Chapter 3: Articles of Faith |url=https://www.pewforum.org/2012/08/09/the-worlds-muslims-unity-and-diversity-3-articles-of-faith/ |access-date=13 September 2019 |website=Pew Research Center. Religion & Public Life}}</ref> The expectation is most common in Afghanistan (83%), followed by Iraq (72%), Turkey (68%), Tunisia (67%), Malaysia (62%), Pakistan (60%), Lebanon (56%), and Muslims in southern Thailand (57%).<ref name="pew-Muslims-2012"/>

Stories of end times and doomsday tend to be passed on as bedtime stories or informal talk among the lay Muslims, rather than in the Imam's Friday ''[[khutbah]]''.  "Even Muslims with low levels of knowledge have heard parts of parts of it", according to scholar Jean Pierre Filiu.{{#tag:ref|In conversation to Graeme Wood.<ref name="GWWotS2016:251">[[#GWWotS2016|Wood, ''The Way of the Strangers'', 2016]]: p.251</ref>|group="nb"}} In Islamic bookstores, their "dramatic and sensational stories of final battles between good and evil, supernatural powers, the ultimate rise of a Muslim elite," are naturally more attention getting than more orthodox/studious works on prayer, purity or the lives of exemplary Muslims.<ref name="GWWotS2016:251"/> More official Muslim sources have often either kept quiet about apocalyptic hadith or outright denied  their existence—an example being [[Nihad Awad]] of the [[Council on American-Islamic Relations]] who stated "There is no apocalyptic bloodbath in Islam."<ref name=GWWotS2016:251/>

Characters can also be used by some religious groups with some shifts; [[Said Nursi]] with the concept and meaning modifications in adapting to the time he lived in, highlights the concept of [[Sufyani]] instead of Dajjal and applies [[Abjad|numerologic methods]] to some [[Āyah]]/[[hadith]] fragments, making signs of [[Nur movement|his followers community]] as Mahdi (Collective ID; Sahs al-manawi”)<ref>Even more important is the realization of some of the difficulties and needs of the modern era, the Mahdi thought, contrary to the classical sources are defended by a “person” from the “ spiritual personal”
name is given to his community.https://isamveri.org/pdfdrg/D03701/2019_23/2019_23_DEMIRH.pdf</ref> and possible dates for apocalypse.<ref>{{Cite web |title=The Apocalypse in the Teachings of Bediuzzaman Said Nursi - Risale-i Nur |url=http://risaleinur.com/studies/131-conferences/2000/3967-the-apocalypse-in-the-teachings-of-bediuzzaman-said-nursi.html |access-date=2024-07-29 |website=risaleinur.com}}</ref>

Popular Islamic pamphlets and tracts on the End Times have always been in circulation, but until around 2010 their "impact on political and theological thinking was practically nil" among Sunnis.<ref name=JSISISCFB2015:220>[[#JSISISCFB2015|Stern, ''ISIS'', "The coming final battle",  2015]]: p.220</ref> Interest in the End Times is particularly strong among jihadis and "since the mid-2000s, the apocalyptic currents in jihadism have surged."<ref name=GWWotS2016:251/> As of 2011, the belief that the end of the world is at hand and will be precipitated by an apocalyptic Great Battle has been noted as a "fast-growing belief in Muslim countries" though still a minority belief.{{#tag:ref|from blurb for {{cite book |last = Filiu |first = Jean-Pierre |translator-last = DeBevoise |translator-first = M. B. |title = Apocalypse in Islam |url = https://archive.org/details/apocalypseinisla0852fili_W3CSK |year = 2011 |publisher = University of California Press |location = Berkeley |isbn = 978-0-520-26431-1}}<ref name="blurb-UCP">{{cite book |title=Apocalypse in Islam |url=https://www.ucpress.edu/book/9780520272644/apocalypse-in-islam |publisher=University of California Press |date=January 2011 |isbn=9780520272644 |access-date=17 April 2022|last1=Filiu |first1=Jean-Pierre }}</ref>|group="nb"}}

=== Shiʿi Islam ===
According to J.-P. Filiu, the uprising of the (Shiʿi) [[Mahdi Army]] in Iraq and [[2006 Lebanon War|July 2006 war between Israel and (Shiʿi) Hizbullah]] are "at least in part" a consequence of "mounting eschatological expectations" coming from copious literature preaching that the return of the Hidden Imam was imminent; literature emanating from  the Shiʿi seminaries and scholars of holy city of [[Najaf]], Iraq, from Lebanon, and from Iran during the administration of its president [[Mahmoud Ahmadinejad]].<ref name=JPFAiI2011:141>[[#JPFAiI2011|Filiu, ''Apocalypse in Islam '', 2011]]: p.141</ref> One Shiʿi Ayatollah, [[Muhammad Baqir al-Sadr]], revered as "[[Five Martyrs of Shia Islam|the fifth martyr]]" of Shiʿi Islam (killed by [[Saddam Hussein]]),  went to the trouble of trying to explain how the Hidden Imam could be over 1000 years old, and why the present is a propitious time for the reappearance of him.<ref name=JPFAiI2011:142-3>[[#JPFAiI2011|Filiu, ''Apocalypse in Islam '', 2011]]: p.142-3</ref> Muqtada al-Sadr's Mahdi army waged a violent struggle against the American military through 2004,  and its ranks swelled with thousands of recruits. Muqtada's political faction won seats in parliament.<ref name=JPFAiI2011:148>[[#JPFAiI2011|Filiu, ''Apocalypse in Islam '', 2011]]: p.148</ref> During Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's presidency (2005-2013), he shared with Iranians his "avowed conviction" that believers must actively work for the Mahdi's reappearance, despite this bringing him "into conflict with the highest authorities of Shiism".<ref name=JPFAiI2011:151>[[#JPFAiI2011|Filiu, ''Apocalypse in Islam '', 2011]]: p.151</ref>

===Popular apocalyptic literature===
"Dramatic and sensational stories" of the apocalypse first made an impact in the mid-1980s when Said Ayyub's ''Al-Masīh al-Dajjāl'' (The Anti-Christ) started a whole new genre of Islamic "apocalyptic fiction"<ref name=JPFAiI2011:88/> or "millenarian speculation"<ref name=JPFAiI2011:92>[[#JPFAiI2011|Filiu, ''Apocalypse in Islam '', 2011]]: p.92</ref> throughout the Arab world. The book was so successful Ayyub went on to write a half-dozen other spinoff books, inspired imitators who enjoyed even greater success (Muhammad Izzat Arif, Muhammad Isa Dawud,<ref name="JPFAiI2011:89-92">[[#JPFAiI2011|Filiu, ''Apocalypse in Islam '', 2011]]: p.89-92</ref> and Mansur AbdelHakim).<ref name=JPFAiI2011:122>[[#JISYYHIU1981|Filiu, ''Apocalypse in Islam '', 2011]]: p.122</ref>

The book (and the genre) was noteworthy for rupturing the "organic link between Islamic tradition and the last days of the world",<ref name=JPFAiI2011:88>[[#JPFAiI2011|Filiu, ''Apocalypse in Islam '', 2011]]: p.88</ref> using Western sources (such as [[Gustave Le Bon]] and [[William Guy Carr]]) that previously would have been ignored; and lack of  [[Sahih Bukhari]] (i.e. top quality) hadith (he does quote [[Ibn Kathir]] and some hadith "repeated at second hand"); and for an obsessively anti-Jewish point of view ("in all great transformations of thought, there is a Jewish factor, avowed and plain, or else hidden and secret",<ref name=JPFAiI2011:85>[[#JPFAiI2011|Filiu, ''Apocalypse in Islam '', 2011]]: p.85</ref> "the Jews are planning the Third World War in order to eliminate the Islamic world and all opposition to Israel",<ref name=JPFAiI2011:86-87>[[#JPFAiI2011|Filiu, ''Apocalypse in Islam '', 2011]]: p.86-87</ref> and cover art featuring a grotesque cartoon figure with a [[Star of David]] and large hooked nose).<ref name=JPFAiI2011:85/><ref name=JPFAiI2011:plate-1>[[#JPFAiI2011|Filiu, ''Apocalypse in Islam '', 2011]]: plate 1</ref>

Unlike traditional popular works of Islamic eschatology that kept close to scripture and classical manuals of eschatology in describing ''al-Dajjāl'', Said Ayyub portrayed the Dajjāl as 1) the true [[Messiah in Judaism|Jewish messiah]], that Jews had been waiting for, 2) a figure who will appear or reappear not only in end times, but one who has been working throughout the history of humanity to create havoc with such diabolical success that human history is really "only a succession of nefarious maneuvers" by him.  Intermediaries of al-dajjal (according to Ayyub) include St. [[Paul the Apostle]], who (Ayyub maintains) created Christianity by distorting the true story of Jesus, the [[Constantine the Great|Emperor Constantine]] who made possible "the Crusader state in service to the Jews", the [[Freemasonry|Freemasons]], [[Napoleon]], the United States of America, [[Communism|Communist]]s, Israel, etc.  He concludes that the dajjal is hiding in Palestine (but will also "appear in Khurasan as the head of an expansionist state") and the Great Battle between Muslims and his forces will be World War III fought in the Middle East.<ref name="JPFAiI2011:83-9">[[#JPFAiI2011|Filiu, ''Apocalypse in Islam '', 2011]]: p.83-89</ref>

Later books, ''The Hidden Link between the AntiChrist, the Secrets of the Bermuda Triangle, and Flying Saucers'' (1994), by Muhammad Isa Dawud, for example, move even farther away from traditional themes,  disclosing that the Anti-Christ journeyed from the Middle East to the archipelago of [[Bermuda]] in the 8th century CE to make it his home base and from whence he fomented the French Revolution and other mischief, and now sends flying saucers to patrol Egypt and prepare for his eventual triumphal return to Jerusalem.<ref name=JPFAiI2011:93-94>[[#JPFAiI2011|Filiu, ''Apocalypse in Islam '', 2011]]: p.93-94</ref>

The success of the genre provoked a "counteroffensive" by pious conservatives (Abdellatif Ashur, Muhammad Bayyumi Magdi, and Muhammad Shahawi) disturbed by the liberties Said Ayyub and others had taken with Islamic doctrine.<ref name="JPFAiI2011:89-92"/>

===Jihadist references===

In the early 1980s, when [[Abdullah Azzam]], called on Muslims around the world to join the jihad in Afghanistan, he considered the fight "to be a sign that the end times were imminent".   Also around that time, popular Islamic writers, such as Said Ayyub, started blaming Islamic decline in the face of the Western world, not on lack of technology and development, but on the forces of the Dajjal.<ref name="Akyol-nyt-3-10-16">{{cite news |last1=Akyol |first1=Mustafa |title=The Problem With the Islamic Apocalypse |newspaper=The New York Times |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2016/10/04/opinion/the-problem-with-the-islamic-apocalypse.html |access-date=29 January 2022 |agency=New York Times |date=3 October 2016}}</ref>

[[Al-Qaeda]] used "apocalyptic predictions in both its internal and external messaging" according to Jessica Stern, and its use of "the name [[Greater Khorasan|Khorasan]], a region that includes part of Iran, Central Asia, and Afghanistan, and from which, it is prophesied, the Mahdi will emerge alongside an army bearing black flags", was thought to be a symbol of end times.<ref name=JSISISCFB2015:220/> But these claims were "mostly symbolic",<ref name=JSISISCFB2015:220/> and according to Wood, [[Osama bin Laden|Bin Laden]] "rarely mentioned" the [[Apocalypse]] and when he did, "he implied he would be long dead when it arrived" (a reflection of his more "elite" background according to Will McCants).<ref name=GWWotS2016:252>[[#GWWotS2016|Wood, ''The Way of the Strangers'', 2016]]: p.252</ref> According to J.-P. Filiu, out of the mass of Al-Qaeda documents seized after the fall of the Taliban, only one letter made any reference to the apocalypse.<ref name=JPFAiI2011:185>[[#JPFAiI2011|Filiu, ''Apocalypse in Islam '', 2011]]: p.185</ref>

A prominent jihadist, [[Mustafa Setmariam Nasar|Abu Musʿab al-Sūri]], (called a "sophisticated strategist" and "articulate exponent of the modern [[jihad]]"),<ref name="Malise">{{cite magazine | url=http://www.nybooks.com/articles/21438 | title=The Rise of the Muslim Terrorists | magazine=[[New York Review of Books]] | pages=33–36, 34 | author=Malise Ruthven | date=29 May 2008 | access-date=20 January 2009 }}</ref><ref name="Reuters">{{cite news| url=https://www.reuters.com/article/latestCrisis/idUSLA456186 | title=Al Qaeda ideologue in Syrian detention – lawyers | date=10 Jun 2009 <!-- 12:54&nbsp;pm EDT --> | access-date=2 Sep 2009| quote=In brief remarks to Reuters, Nasar's wife, Elena Moreno, said she had also come to believe her husband was probably in Syria, following what she called recent but unofficial confirmation.| first=William| last=MacLean}}</ref>  somewhat independent and critical of Al-Qaeda, was also much more interested in end times. He wrote, "I have no doubt that we have entered into the age of battles and tribulations [''zāman al-malāhim wal-fitan'']"<ref>page 62 of the Arabic version of ''A Call to Global Islamic Resistance'' that was published via a now-defunct website in January 2005; quoted in [[#JPFAiI2011|Filiu, ''Apocalypse in Islam '', 2011]]: p.187</ref>  He devoted the last 100 pages of his magnum opus on jihad (''A Call to Global Islamic Resistance'', made available online around 2005) to matters such as the proper chronology and location of related battles and other activities  of the [[Mahdi]], the [[Al-Masih ad-Dajjal|Antichrist]], the mountain of gold to be found in the Euphrates river, the [[Sufyani]], [[Gog and Magog]], etc.<ref name=JPFAiI2011:186-191>[[#JPFAiI2011|Filiu, ''Apocalypse in Islam '', 2011]]: p.186-191</ref>

Abu Musʿab al Zarqawi, the founder of what would become the [[Islamic State]] "injected" the apocalyptic message into jihad.<ref name=GWWotS2016:252/> [[Islamic State|ISIS]] has evoked "the apocalyptic tradition much more explicitly" than earlier jihadis. [[Dabiq, Syria]] –  a town understood "in some versions" of the eschatological "narrative to be a possible location for the final apocalyptic battle" –  was captured by ISIS and made its capital. ISIS also declared its "intent to conquer [[Constantinople]]" –  Muslims conquering Constantinople being another end times prophesy.<ref name=JSISISCFB2015:220/> Interviews by the ''[[New York Times]]'',<ref name=JSISISCFB2015:222>[[#JSISISCFB2015|Stern, ''ISIS'', "The coming final battle",  2015]]: p.222</ref> and Jurgen Todenhöfer<ref name=GWWotS2016:268>[[#GWWotS2016|Wood, ''The Way of the Strangers'', 2016]]: p.268</ref> with many dozens of Muslims who had traveled to fight with Islamic State, and by Graeme Wood with Islamic State supporters elsewhere, found "messianic expectation" a strong motivator to join Islamic State.<ref name=JSISISCFB2015:222/>
;Shiʿi Islam
While Al-Qaeda and Islamic State are Sunni, Shia insurgents/militants have also been "drawn to the battlefield" by "apocalyptic belief", according to William McCants, who quotes a Shia fighter in Iraq saying, "'I was waiting for the day when I will fight in Syria. Thank God he chose me to be one of the Imam's soldiers.'"<ref name="McCants-BI-2014">{{cite web |last1=McCants |first1=William |title=The Foreign Policy Essay: The Sectarian Apocalypse |url=https://www.brookings.edu/opinions/the-foreign-policy-essay-the-sectarian-apocalypse/ |website=Brookings Institution |access-date=22 April 2022 |date=26 October 2014}}</ref>

Some dissident Shiʿa in Iraq, oppose not only Sunni, US and Iraqi government forces, but the Shiʿi religious hierarchy as well.  In Najaf, in late January 2007, at least 200 were killed in the [[Battle of Najaf (2007)|Battle of Najaf]],<ref>{{cite web
|url = https://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-iraq19jan19,0,4037083.story?coll=la-home-center
|title = 80 killed in clashes in Iraq
|first = Alexandra
|last = Zavis
|work = Los Angeles Times
|date = 2008-01-19
}}</ref>
<ref>{{cite news
|url = https://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/01/18/AR2008011803321.html
|title = Dozens Killed in Clashes In S. Iraq: Obscure Sect Presents First Major Challenge For Area's Iraqi Forces
|first = Amit R.
|last = Paley
|newspaper = [[The Washington Post]]
|date = 2008-01-19
}}</ref><ref>[http://www.juancole.com/2007/01/fighters-for-shiite-messiah-clash-with.html Fighters for Shiite Messiah Clash with Najaf Security, 250 Dead Over 60 Dead in Baghdad, Kirkuk Violence], Informed Comment, Juan Cole</ref> when several hundred members of an armed [[Iraq]]i [[Shia|Shi'a]] [[messiah|messianic]] [[sect]] known as the [[Soldiers of Heaven]] or ''Jund As-Samāʾ''({{langx|ar|جند السماء}}), allegedly attempted to  start a "messianic insurrection" during the holy day of [[Ashura]] in the holy city of [[Najaf]];<ref name=JPFAiI2011:160>[[#JPFAiI2011|Filiu, ''Apocalypse in Islam '', 2011]]: p.160</ref> planning to disguise themselves as [[pilgrims]] and kill leading Shi'a [[cleric]]s.<ref>[http://www.theage.com.au/news/world/us-iraqi-forces-kill-250-militants-in-najaf/2007/01/29/1169919241141.html?page=2 Page 2], US, Iraqi forces kill 250 militants in Najaf, The Age, 29 January 2007</ref> The group allegedly believed that spreading chaos would hasten the return of the [[12th Imam]]/[[Mahdi]],<ref name=depillis>{{cite web
|url = http://www.slate.com/id/2182511/
|title = Today's Papers: Kick in the Pants
|first = Lydia
|last = DePillis
|publisher = Slate
|date = 2008-01-19
}}</ref><ref name=theage-2007>[http://www.theage.com.au/news/world/us-iraqi-forces-kill-250-militants-in-najaf/2007/01/29/1169919241141.html "US-Iraqi Forces Kill 250 Militants in Najaf"], [[The Age]], 29 January 2007</ref><ref name=cnn-cult-2007>[https://web.archive.org/web/20080125052818/http://edition.cnn.com/2007/WORLD/meast/01/29/iraq.main/index.html Cult plotted attack on Shiite clerics, Iraqis say] - [[CNN]] 29 January 2007</ref>  or alternately, that their leader, [[Dia Abdul Zahra Kadim]], was the awaited Mahdi.<ref name="Abu Zeed-2-2-2015">{{cite news |last1=Abu Zeed |first1=Adnan |title='Messengers of God' multiply amidst Iraqi chaos |url=https://www.al-monitor.com/originals/2015/02/iraq-imam-shiite-messenger-disciples.html |access-date=2 June 2022 |agency=Al Monitor |date=2 February 2015}}</ref> The next year during Ashura a reported 18 officers and 53 militia members were killed in clashes between "millenarian rebels" and police,<ref name=JPFAiI2011:162>[[#JPFAiI2011|Filiu, ''Apocalypse in Islam '', 2011]]: p.162</ref> the violence blamed on followers of one [[Ahmad al-Hassan]], a man claiming the [[Occultation (Islam)|Hidden Iman]] had designated him as his (the Hidden Imam's) representative (''wassi''), and who accused Ayatollahs/Shia clerics of being guilty of "aberration and treason, of occupation and tyranny".<ref name=JPFAiI2011:159>[[#JPFAiI2011|Filiu, ''Apocalypse in Islam '', 2011]]: p.159</ref>

===Islamic State claims of prophecy fulfilment===
Jihadis of the [[Islamic State]] see the fulfillment of many of [[Signs of the coming of Judgement Day|the "lesser signs" of the coming of Judgement Day]] in current events.
Its generally agreed that [[Arab–Israeli conflict#History|Israel Arab wars]] have been wars between Muslims and Jews (which were prophesied), and that moral standards have declined leading to  rampant fornication, alcohol consumption, and music listening.<ref name=GWWotS2016:249/> "A slave giving birth to her master" can happen when the child of a slave woman and the slave's owner inherits the slave after the owner's death—slavery being practiced in the [[Islamic State]] (until its defeat).<ref name=GWWotS2016:249/> An embargo of Iraq<ref name=GWWotS2016:249/> is alleged to be foretold in the hadith "Iraq would withhold its dirhams and qafiz".<ref>Sahih Muslim Book 041, Hadith Number 6923</ref> That Muslim states are being led by those who do not deserve to lead them,<ref name=buhari-6496 >{{cite web |title=Sahih Bukhari, Volume 8, Book 076, Hadith 503 |author=Bukhari |url=https://sunnah.com/bukhari:6496 |access-date=14 April 2022}}</ref> is an article of faith among jihadis and many other Muslims.  ISIS alleges that worship of the pre-Islamic deity ''al-Lat'' is being practiced by its Shia enemy [[Hezbollah]].  The naked shepherds who will build tall buildings is interpreted to refer to  Gulf State builders of skyscrapers<ref name="Globalist-2017">{{cite web |title=The Spread of Gulf State Skyscrapers |url=https://www.theglobalist.com/the-spread-of-gulf-state-skyscrapers/ |website=The Globalist |access-date=14 April 2022 |date=21 May 2017}}</ref> are "only a generation or two out of desert poverty".<ref name=GWWotS2016:249>[[#GWWotS2016|Wood, ''The Way of the Strangers'', 2016]]: p.249</ref>

But the Islamic State is also attempting to fulfill prophecies itself to hasten end times.
Zarqawi published "communiqués detailing the fulfillment of specific predictions" found in a famous book on jihad and end times called, ''A Call to a Global Islamic Resistance'' by Abu Musab al Suri.  His successor, [[Abu Omar al-Baghdadi|Al-Baghdadi]], took "the fulfillment of apocalyptic portents even more seriously".<ref name=JSISISCFB2015:224>[[#JSISISCFB2015|Stern, ''ISIS'' "The coming final battle",  2015]]: p.224</ref>
According to Hassan Abbas,{{#tag:ref|"an expert on jihadi movements"|group="nb"}} at least part of ISIS's motivation in killing and otherwise provoking Shia is to "deliberately ... instigate a war between Sunnis and Shi'a, in the belief that a sectarian war would be a sign that the final times has arrived"; and also explains the ISIS [[Siege of Kobanî]]: "In the eschatological literature, there is reference to crisis in Syria and massacre of Kurds—this is why [[Kobanî#Syrian Civil War|Kobane]] is important."(The town of 45,000 was under siege by ISIS from September 2014 to January 2015.)<ref name=JSISISCFB2015:220-1>[[#JSISISCFB2015|Stern, ''ISIS'' "The coming final battle",  2015]]: p.220-221</ref>

Thus, "ISIS's obsession with the end of the world" helps explain its lack of interest in the "ordinary moral rules" of the temporal world, according to Jessica Stern.
If you are "participating in a cosmic war between good and evil", (and if everyone will be dead and then resurrected relatively soon anyway), pedestrian concerns about saving the lives of the innocent are of little concern.<ref name=JSISISCFB2015:224-5>[[#JSISISCFB2015|Stern, ''ISIS'' "The coming final battle",  2015]]: p224-225</ref>

=== Questions and criticism ===
Among the problems critics see with some of the concepts of, and attention given to, the eschatology of Islam, are its effect on the socio-economic health of the Muslim world, the basis of the scripture (particularly the hadith) dealing with end times, and the rational implausibility of some of the theological concepts such as resurrection of the dead.

[[Mustafa Akyol]] criticizes the current focus of the Muslim community on apocalypticism and the use of the forces of the [[Dajjal]] to explain stagnation in the Muslim world in the past two centuries vis-à-vis the West (and now East Asia). He argues that if supernatural evil is believed to be the cause of the problems of Muslims, then practical solutions such as "science, economic development and liberal democracy" will be ignored in favor of divine intervention.<ref name="Akyol-NYT-3-10-16">{{cite news |last1=Akyol |first1=v |title=The Problem With the Islamic Apocalypse |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2016/10/04/opinion/the-problem-with-the-islamic-apocalypse.html?auth=login-email&login=email |access-date=13 September 2019 |work=[[The New York Times]] |date=3 October 2016}}</ref><ref name="pew-Muslims-2012"/> (On the other hand, a sahih hadith reports Muhammad saying that "If the Final Hour comes while you have a shoot of a plant in your hands and it is possible to plant it before the Hour comes, you should plant it.")<ref>{{cite web |title=Al-Adab Al-Mufrad. 27 Attending to this world. Hadith 479 |url=https://sunnah.com/urn/2304770 |website=Sunnah.com |access-date=2 May 2022}}</ref>

Western scholars ([[William McCants]], Jane Smith, Yvonne Haddad, [[Jean-Pierre Filiu]]) agree that the apocalyptic narratives are strongly connected to the early jihad wars against the [[Byzantine Empire]] and civil wars against other Muslims. McCants, writes that the ''fitan'' ("tribulations") of the minor and lesser signs come from the ''fitan'' of the early Islamic civil wars ([[First Fitna]] (656–661 CE), [[Second Fitna]] (c. 680/683–c. 685/692 CE), [[Third Fitna]] (744–750/752 CE)), where Muhammad's companions ([[Sahabah]]) and successor generations ([[Tabi'un]] and [[Tabi' al-Tabi'in|Taba Tabi'in]]) fought each other for political supremacy.<ref name="McCants-BI-2014"/> "Before and after each tribulation, partisans on both sides circulated prophecies in the name of the Prophet to support their champion. With time, the context was forgotten but the prophecies remained."<ref name="McCants-BI-2014"/>  Smith and Haddad also write that "the political implications of the whole millennial idea in Islam, especially as related to the understanding of the ''mahdi'' and the rise of the 'Abbasids in the second Islamic century, are very difficult to separate from the eschatological ones."<ref name="JISYYHIU1981:70">[[Islamic eschatology#JISYYHIU1981|Smith & Haddad, ''Islamic Understanding'',  1981]]: p. 70.</ref> They also argue that it's "difficult to determine whether" Muḥammad "actually anticipated the arrival" the ''Mahdi'' as "an eschatological figure" –  despite the fact that "most of the traditions about the ''Mahdi'' are credited to  Muḥammad."<ref name=JISYYHIU1981:70/> Filiu has also stated that "the apocalyptic narrative was decisively influenced by the conflicts that filled Islam's early years, campaigns and jihad against the Byzantine Empire and recurrent civil wars among Muslims."<ref name="JPFAiI2011:28">[[Islamic eschatology#JPFAiI2011|Filiu, ''Apocalypse in Islam '',  2011]]: p. 28.</ref> Consequently, the reliability of hadith on end times has been questioned.

Skepticism of the concept of the [[resurrection]] of the dead has been part of both "the compatriots" of Muhammad and the "rational and scientifically-infused" inhabitants of the contemporary world.
<blockquote>The fact of the resurrection of the body has been of continuing importance to Muslims and has raised very particular questions in certain circles of Islamic thought, such as those reflected in the later disputations between philosophy and theology.{{#tag:ref|  See al-Ghazali's Tahafut al-falasifa, Problem XX, "Refutation of their Denial of the Resurrection of Bodies" (tr. S. A. Kamali, [1963]), in which al-Ghazali replies point by point to objections raised by Muslim philosophers to the fact of physical resurrection. This position was countered by Ibn Rushd in his Tahafut al-tahafut, in which he contends that only the soul survives the death of the physical body.|group="nb"}} It was not really a point of issue for early Islam, however, and bodily resurrection has never been seriously denied by orthodoxy. It is, as many have observed, basic to the message of God as proclaimed by Muhammad and articulated clearly by the Qur'an,{{#tag:ref| Ash'ari theology taught that the resurrection of the body is not an element of faith common to Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, but that it was revealed in its full understanding for the first time in the Qur'an.|group="nb"}} especially in those passages in which the contemporaries of Muhammad are presented as having scoffed or raised doubts. It continues to be, ... a point of conviction for many of the contemporary interpreters of Islam to a world in which a rational and scientifically-infused populace continues to raise the same eyebrows of skepticism as did the compatriots of the Prophet.<ref name="JISYYHIU1981:163">[[#JISYYHIU1981|Smith & Haddad, ''Islamic Understanding'',  1981]]: p.163</ref></blockquote>

Early skeptics being quoted in the Quran as saying: "Are we to be returned to our former state when we have become decayed bones? They say, that would be a detrimental return!" (Q79: 10–12).<ref name="JISYYHIU1981:1">[[Islamic eschatology#JISYYHIU1981|Smith & Haddad, ''Islamic Understanding'',  1981]]: p.1.</ref>

==See also==
{{columns-list|
* [[Eschatology]]
* [[Signs of the coming of Judgement Day]]
* [[Imran N. Hosein]]
* [[Nafs-e-Zakiyyah (Pure soul)]]
* [[Schools of Islamic theology]]
* [[Shia eschatology]]
* [[Signs of the reappearance of Muhammad al-Mahdi]]
}}

==References==
===Notes===
{{reflist|group=nb}}
{{notelist-lr}}

===Citations===
{{reflist}}

===Bibliography===
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*{{cite book |last1=Wood |first1=Graeme |title=The Way of the Strangers: Encounters with the Islamic State |date=2016 |publisher=Random House |chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=bPoOCwAAQBAJ&q=al-Bahrumi&pg=PT132 |chapter=The War of the End of Time |pages=246–269 |isbn=9780812988765 |ref=GWWotS2016 }}
{{refend}}

==Further reading==
* "''[[Fath al-Bari]]''" (from ''[[Sahih al-Bukhari]]'' by [[ibn Hajar al-Asqalani]]).
* Esposito, John, ''The Oxford Dictionary of Islam'', Oxford University Press, 2003, {{ISBN|0-19-512558-4}}.
* Richard C. Martin, Said Amir Arjomand, Marcia Hermansen, Abdulkader Tayob, Rochelle Davis, John Obert Voll, ''Encyclopedia of Islam and the Muslim World'', MacMillan Reference Books, 2003, {{ISBN|978-0028656038}}.
* Lawson, Todd (1999). ''[https://www.academia.edu/3679569/Duality_Opposition_and_Typology_in_the_Quran_The_Apocalyptic_Substrate Duality, Opposition and Typology in the Qur'an: The Apocalyptic Substrate]''.     Journal of Quranic Studies. 10: 23–49.

{{Islamic theology}}
{{Doomsday}}
{{Theology}}

[[Category:Islamic eschatology| ]]