Article 20 — Heaven and Hell
Heaven and Hell: Two worlds, two spiritual states, or a deeper reality?
The Goal of the Wise — Door Number Twenty
Read aloud in English
What are Heaven and Hell truly like? Are they physical places, spiritual realities, or experiences that our present understanding does not allow us to grasp fully?
The Jewish, Christian and Muslim traditions speak of the destiny of souls after death.
Yet their descriptions of Heaven and Hell have given rise to many interpretations.
In the twentieth Door of The Goal of the Wise, Abdullah Hashem Aba Al-Sadiq (From Him is Peace) examines these representations and seeks to move beyond a purely material understanding of the afterlife.
The limits of our imagination
The chapter recalls a tradition according to which God is said to have prepared for the righteous realities that no eye has seen and that no human mind has fully imagined.
This idea raises a fundamental difficulty.
How can one describe a reality that would surpass the experiences of our world?
Images of gardens, rivers, food or beauty can be understood as means of making intelligible what remains unknown.
Heaven as fulfillment
In the spiritual perspective of the book, Heaven cannot be reduced to an accumulation of material pleasures.
It also refers to divine proximity, to peace and to the fulfillment of the soul.
This reflection connects with the chapters devoted to the nature of reality.
If the earthly world is transitory, then true happiness cannot be identified solely with temporary satisfactions.
Hell and the consequences of actions
The question of Hell leads to an examination of divine justice.
How are we to understand suffering, responsibility and the consequences of actions?
The chapter belongs to a vision in which the soul pursues a spiritual journey and in which human choices have a significance that extends beyond the present life.
It thus invites reflection on the link between actions, inner state and the destiny of the soul.
A reflection on justice and mercy
Heaven and Hell also raise a moral question: how can God’s justice be reconciled with His mercy?
The book addresses these themes within the framework of its general conception of the soul and its evolution.
It invites the reader not to reduce religion to the pursuit of a reward or the fear of a punishment.
Conclusion — What is true happiness?
The twentieth Door presents Heaven and Hell as realities whose meaning perhaps goes beyond the images to which we are accustomed.
What if understanding the afterlife first required understanding what we truly are?