The Qur'an declares that the gates of heaven will open wide for people who show the will to build the common good together, and that the earth will become a fertile home for these people. A short phenomenological reading of faith — what abundance, prosperity, and fertility mean for human beings, and what is required of believers in turn.

The Qur’an declares that the gates of heaven will open wide for people who show the will to build the common good together, and that the earth will become a fertile home for these people. Abundance, prosperity or fertility refers to the continuity, value and respectability of what is good. The human imagination produced Ishtar in Mesopotamia, Cybele in Anatolia, Venus in Rome as symbols of this fertility. The Qur’an attributes the fertility of heaven and earth to human beings:

“If people believe in Allah, if they are pious towards Allah, if they do not deny Him, the gates of heaven will open wide with abundance. Otherwise, all their efforts will hasten their destruction and they will be clothed in a garment of hunger and fear.”

I would like to draw the reader’s attention to the phenomenology of the expressions in this verse:

  • Faith in God must be the source of trust and confidence among people.
  • To condemn ignoring Allah must entail the condemnation of the racist mentality that marginalizes and ignores others.
  • Fear of God must entail fear of violating people’s rights.
  • A holy book is holy only to the extent that it protects and blesses the lives of people. It must derive its sanctity not only from God but also from the respect of the people whose rights and freedoms it protects.
  • The believer who begins everything with the name of Allah, the Most Merciful, the Most Gracious, should show the compassion/love he expects from Allah to his fellow human beings; his basic principle of life should be to benefit every living being, every breathing creature. For “Only that which is of benefit to mankind can last forever on earth.” This is the only way for religion to become a religion of life.

In this case, life is testing each one of us on the concrete fact of whether or not we ‘benefit people/humanity’ without expecting anything in return. We are being tested with our existence, with our humanity. The test is understood as being patient with the evil things that happen to us. It is not like that. The test is the struggle to eradicate evil. It is to increase our human sensitivity to prevent those evils from happening to anyone. It is to feel the tragedy that befalls every single human being, regardless of religion, language or race and to share the same pain they subject to. It is to desire much better than what is available for everyone. And to give people confidence and hope. Remember: “Where there is religion there is hope, where there is hope there is religion.”

References

  • 7/A’râf, 96.
  • 16/Nahl, 112.
  • 13/Ra’d, 17.

Cover & accompanying photograph: Tomb of İmâm Abû Mansûr al-Mâturîdī, Samarqand.