If you are in need of Faith, O intelligent man, as has already been explained, then you are in need of it to escape the punishment of the Fire and be amongst the dwellers of Paradise, and because Allah refuses to accept the Muslim and the sinner on the same level, and because He who created the heavens and the earth in truth will inevitably establish the balance in all of man’s affairs, and because He Who created the heavens and the earth in truth will inevitably establish the balance in all of man’s affairs, and because He Who preserved you from the time you were a small sperm will not allow your life to go waste, and because this defective stage of man’s life will not be complete and the wisdom behind it will not be complete and the wisdom behind it will not be clear except with the other life, and because the records which are kept by the earth must be presented once again, and because man’s wants will not be satisfied except with what the Creator has prepared for him in the Hereafter because these wants were created for the Hereafter, and because it is easy for Him Who originated creation to repeat it once again, and because He Who decreed life and death sent truthful messenger’s and supported them with proofs and clear signs and they informed us of our destiny, about Allah’s punishment for the sinners in a Fire whose fuel is men and stones and about the supreme bliss in a Paradise whose expanse is that of the heavens and earth; the apostle Muhammad, peace be upon him, informed us that he was the seal of prophets and that the reckoning has drawn close; he spoke to us of the signs of the approach of the Hour which will come after him and we are seeing that they have already begun to take place; no-one in the past would have believed that they would occur except for the fact that it was Allah’s messenger who spoke about them on instructions from his Lord, and today we are seeing them exactly as he spoke of them and tomorrow the occupants of Hell will see what their Lord had promised them and the occupants of Heaven will see what their Lord had promised them. Here are a few of the signs which Allah’s messenger told us about:

1. The appearance of Wondrous things which never occurred to the mind. This is the age of wonders in inventions, principles, morals and organisations. In this age we have seen many great things which would never have occurred to our minds. The messengers of Allah informed us of this time so that our thoughts do not become confused and our hearts not swayed by extraordinary events. He said: “ The Hour will not rise until you see great matters which you never saw before and which never occurred to your minds.” He also said: “ Before the Hour rises you will see great things which you do not know and you will say: ‘ were we spoken to of this?’ So when you see this then remember Allah Almighty and know that it is the first signs of the Hour.”

2. The poor, barebacked, barefooted shepherds will build lofty buildings. No man who is a non-believer or is ignorant of Hadith would have believed that the barefooted shepherd who owns not a shoe or clothing or food would be able to build huge buildings and view with others in the height of their buildings until we saw petrol coming from the land of the poor barefooted shepherd and suddenly they are vying with one another to erect buildings. The messenger of Allah spoke the truth when he informed us of these centuries before their occurrence. “ When you see the poor, barefooted shepherd vying with one another in buildings then expect the Hour.”

3. The designing of homes as how clothing is designed. No-one in the past would have thought that people would spend so much effort to design their walls and houses and fashion them as how clothing are fashioned because this causes extreme difficulty and because it is not an important matter. Now our age has come and we see the design which Allah’s messenger spoke of when he said: “ the Hour will not rise until people build houses and design them as the design of tailored clothes.”

4. The parts of the earth draw closer. It would never have occurred to anybody’s mind that the parts of the earth would draw closer so that one may see those distant parts all at the same time as happened to the prophet and as he prophesied. He said: “ The earth was folded in for me and I was shown its Eastern most and Western most parts and my Ummah shall reach the extent of all that was brought before me.”

He also informed us that the earth would be drawn close in latter times: “ The Hour will not rise until time gets shorter and the earth is folded in.”

Here it is that the earth has been folded in and the rider in a rocket can see it with him. Distances have become shorter and this is what is meant by the earth’s folding in and time getting shorter. Sounds are heard from far off places and pictures are being transmitted and all this means the folding of the earth and the shortening of time. These are all signs of the Hour as the truthful prophet informed us.

5. The speech of wild beasts, the talking of lifeless things and the carrying of news of the wife to the husband.

Can the wild beasts talk? This was impossible in relation to those who lived before us. But these days they have now begun to talk, some cats have begun to express themselves, and tomorrow other wild beasts will follow. But this is one of the signs of the approach of the Hour, as the messenger of Allah informed us, and tomorrow the Hour will be here just as today some of its signs are here. Likewise, no-one would have believed that lifeless things could talk but today they talk. It was far from people minds that lifeless things would be able to know the state of the home and convey its news to the husband after he has left the house. Now inventors have been able to make a gadget for spying which transfers the news from any place to the bearer of this gadget by means of a special frequency. Tomorrow it will be improved and it will be worn in the shoe in the form of its tongue as we have seen radios already in the form of eyeglasses. But this, too, is one of the signs of the Hour, as the prophet said: “ By Him in Whose hands is my soul, the Hour shall not rise until wild beasts talk to man and a man’s shoe lace and tongue speak to him and tell him of what his family did after him.”

6. An Upsurge of Knowledge with Ignorance of Religion.

It was a natural thing in the past that when literacy spread knowledge and understanding spread and when the amount of governors became plenty, there were plenty of honest men among them because honesty used to be the criterion for the posts of governor and ruler. But this age has brought us the contrary of that, as the prophet said: “ One of the signs of the Hour is the abundance of literate people and the lack of people with understanding, the abundance of governors and the lack of honest people.”

Knowledge used to be proof of one’s strength of faith and ignorance proof of one’s weak faith but now the opposite is true, as the prophet prophesied: “ In latter times there will be ignorant worshippers and sinful literates.”

7. The Abundance of Wealth, The expansion of Commerce and The Spread of Literacy. The prophet said: “ One of the conditions of the Hour is that wealth will spread, commerce will expand and the pen will be uppermost.” The pen being uppermost is a sing of literacy being widespread.

8. Women becoming naked, their swaying and their doing of their hair like the humps of camels.

It would never have occurred to anyone that Muslim women would shed their clothes and sway and adopt any means to excite the passions of men. But the movement toward nakedness is obvious despite the abundance of clothing. These tight clothes make the women look naked and these light, revealing clothes expose their bodies and these short dresses uncover most of their legs despite the abundance of cloth which is supposed to cover what is exposed. There are also the mixed swimming pools in which women can be seen naked except for a small piece of covering over her private parts and breasts! All of the above-mentioned women are clothed yet naked! Most women wear high-heeled shoes to make their bodies lean toward the front so that men’s heads and hearts may lean with them. Along with this nudity and swaying there are also the different hairstyles which make their heads look like camel humps. Our prophet, on whom be peace, informed us of all this and his words seem the outlines of the picture we are seeing now.

He said: “ Two categories from my Ummah whom I have not seen will be in the Fire of Hell. A group of men with whips like the tails of cows with which they beat the people, and women who are clothed yet naked leaning and causing others to lean, their heads are like the swaying humps of camels.”

9. Men dressing like women and women dressing like men.

No-one in the past would have thought that men would dress like women and vice-versa especially those in the tribal desert life where baby girls used to be buried alive out of shame. But Allah’s prophet spoke of that and said that it is one of the signs of the Hour: “ One of the signs of the Hour is that men will dress like women and women will dress like men.

10. The Rearing of dogs, dislike for the rearing of children, and the spread of immorality. No-one could have imagined that people would hate to rear children from their own loins and would love to rear dogs especially in the tribal Arabian environment where they used to take pride in sons and having many children. But Allah removed the curtains of time by bestowing prophethood on His messenger and he informed us that is a sing of the last Hour: “ when the Hour approaches a man would prefer to rear a puppy rather than rearing his own son, the elders will not be respected and the youngsters will not be shown mercy and the children of adultery will be plentiful so much that a man would grasp a woman on the open path. They would be wearing sheepskins over wolves’ hearts, the best of them being the flatterer.”

These are a few of the signs which we have seen. The traditions of the prophet tell us of much more and we have seen many of them. He who told us of the signs of the Hour many centuries before they appeared is the same who told us of the Hour and what will happen in it. All of this urges and pushes the intelligent to think about his destiny as all the prophets explained it just as it urges him to think about this world which he is living in and its purpose.