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THE SIGNS OF JUDGEMENT DAY (I) THE MINOR SIGNS

Prelude

As Muslims, we know that this world, created by Allah, will also be brought to an end by Him, and that it will be followed by a new world in which all people will be resurrected and brought to account for their beliefs, words and deeds. The precise timing of the end of the world is known only to Allah; not even any of the prophets sent by Allah, nor any of the angels closest to Him, know when it is to occur.

“They ask you about the Hour, when will its coming be? Say : its knowledge is only with my Lord. None will reveal it at its time save Him. [Its knowledge] is weighty upon the [inhabitants of the] heavens and the earth. It will not come to you except suddenly. They ask you as if you are well-informed about it. Say : Its knowledge is only with Allah, but most of mankind do not know."[Qur’an, 7:187]

Although we do not know when exactly the world is going to end, Allah and the Prophet (may Allah bless him and his Household and grant them peace)have told us of some of the signs which indicate that the Hour is approaching, drawing nearer. In the Gabriel Hadith, wherein the angel Gabriel took on the form of a man with extremely dark hair and extremely white clothing, and then came and asked the Prophet (may Allah bless him and his Household and grant them peace) about the levels of the religion (Islam, Iman and Ihsan), he asked after that, “Tell me about the Hour.” The Prophet (may Allah bless him and his Household and grant them peace)replied, “The questioned one is not more knowledgeable about it than the questioner,” whereupon Gabriel (peace be upon him) said, “Then tell me about its signs.” He replied, “That the slave girl shall give birth to her mistress, and that you see barefoot, naked, poor shepherds building tall buildings.” [Muslim]

So, there are certain events and signs which will occur on the earth prior to it. These signs are categorized into minor and major signs. The minor signs are those which start occurring well before the Day of Judgement, and which in themselves are not strikingly extraordinary. The major signs are those which will occur closer to the Day of Judgement, and they are bizarre and remarkable.

It is important for us to acquaint ourselves with these signs, so that:

1) We can strengthen our conviction of the truth of the Messenger by seeing his prophecies fulfilled.

“[Allah is] the Knower of the Unseen, such that He does not acquaint anyone with His Unseen. Except he of whom He approves of messengers . . . that one may know that [the Messengers of Allah] have conveyed the message of their Lord, and He encompasses that which is with them, and has enumerated all things.” [Qur’an, 72:27-28. See in particular Mujahid’s interpretation : Mukhtasar Tafsir Ibn Kathir, (3/561).]

2) We can be aware of the details of these matters, especially the trials and tribulations amongst them, so that we are better equipped to deal with them if they occur during our lifetimes. “Fore-warned is fore-armed.”

“And the True Promise draws near, whereupon the eyes of the unbelievers will be fixed [and they will say], ‘Alas for us! We were heedless of this! Nay, we were wrongoders!’” [Qur’an, 21:97]

3) We can heighten our realization of the approach of the Hereafter, and thereby apply ourselves, with increased vigor, to prepare for it. for once the major signs have started to occur, one may fail to do good deeds, or even lose the opportunity to believe and repent if one had not done that by then

“Do they then await only the Hour, that it come to them suddenly? For indeed, it signs have [already started to] come! Then, how can they have their reminder when [the Hour] comes to them?! “ [Qur’an, 47:18]

“On the day that some of the signs of your Lord will come (to pass), faith will not benefit a soul which had not believed before or earned good in its faith.” [Qur’an, 6:158]

“Hasten to do [good] deeds before tribulations like pieces of the darkened night, wherein a man will awaken a believer but be an unbeliever by night, or will be a believer by night and awaken an unbeliever, [and in which] people will sell their religion for some (paltry) worldly provisions.” [Various narrations to this meaning are recorded by : Tirmidhi (gharib), Muslim, Ahmad]

“A time will come upon people wherein the one steadfast to his religion will be like one holding a burning coal.” [Tirmidhi (gharib)]

It is certainly not intended, nor desired, to become complacent with and fatalistic regarding with these tribulations and signs, claiming that one cannot turn back destiny, and that one should therefore sit back, complacently, not attempting to combat the predicted spread of evil and merely awaiting Imam Mahdi or Prophet Jesus (peace be upon them) to bring victory to the truth! By no means! We have been ordered to take certain precautions, and to adopt certain means, to uphold the truth and to combat evil, and even if we fail in the course of that in spite of our utmost effort, we would still have discharged our obligation. On the other hand, if we sit back complacently, then we are accountable for our inaction, and we cannot blame the consequences on destiny. So, we must counter adverse destiny with favorable destiny, and flee from one destiny to another. Shaykh `Abdul-Qadir al-Jaylani said, “I counter the destinies of truth with truth, for [the sake of] truth. The [true] man is he who combats [adverse] destiny, not he who is abandons himself with destiny.”

Some Minor Signs
The minor signs are scattered through the hadith literature, and depending on the method of counting and other criteria, they can number from fifty to over hundred. A couple are mentioned in the Gabriel Hadith. Let us proceed now to mention some more of them.

Hadith 1 w On the authority of Anas : the Prophet (may Allah bless him and his Household and grant them peace)said, “Among the portents of the Hour is that people will compete with one another in [building and decorating] mosques.” [Nasa’i]

Hadith 2 w On the authority of Anas ibn Malik : He said : I heard the Messenger of Allah D say, “Indeed, among the portents of the Hour are that knowledge will decrease, ignorance will abound, adultery will become widespread, wine will be drunk, and men will be few and women will be many, to the extent that there will be a single provider for fifty women.” [Bukhari and Muslim]
Those fifty women need not necessarily all be his wives (which is not allowed in Islam, of course). Although some people may come to falsely legitimize it (as was done by a ruler during the time of al-Qurtubi), it seems probable that among the fifty will be not only wives, but also mother, daughters, sisters, aunts, and the like.

Hadith 3 w “Time will contract (i.e. it will appear to be shorter, and its blessings will vanish, such that people will accomplish less in more time), knowledge will be lifted up, stinginess will be cast [into people’s hearts], tribulations will appear, and killing will be much.” [Ahmad, Bukhari, Muslim, Abu Dawud]

Hadith 4 w “Make haste to do [good] deeds before six [things] :
[1] the leadership of fools,
[2] the proliferation of police / government agents,
[3] the selling of judgement,
[4] blood being taken lightly,
[5] severance of [ties of] kinship,
[6] people who will take the Qur’an as music, sending ahead one of them to sing for them, even though he may be least of them in knowledge/understanding [of the religion].” [Ahmad, Tabarani]

We can extract from this hadith several general phenomena, each of which we discuss at greater length

Decline in Religious Knowledge and Practice
We have seen this indicated in several of the ahadith above, or perhaps in all of them at, least indirectly. The knowledge which has been prophesied to decrease is of knowledge about Islam. Secular knowledge, however, need not necessarily decrease; to the contrary it may increase. One hadith mentions that publications will increase. Another narration might be taken as predicting the appearance of cars.

Disappearance of Knowledge
Knowledge of Islam disappears with the death of the Islamic scholars (`ulama’).
“Allah will not retract this knowledge by a withdrawal, [suddenly] withdrawing it from people’s hearts, but He will retract knowledge by retracting the scholars, until, when He has left no scholar, people will take ignorant leaders, who will be asked, and will pronounce verdicts without knowledge, thus going astray and leading others astray.” [Bukhari, Muslim]
And, when both scholars and knowledge have become scarce amongst people, such that they can either not find qualified scholars, or are unaware even of the qualifications to look for in people whom one consults on religious matter, then it is quite understandable that they should start to regard as religious authorities such people as are unqualified to be such.
“Indeed, among the signs of the Hour are that knowledge be sought with the petty ones.” [Tabarani]
This, along with the disappearance of the scholars of higher caliber, is something we have already started witnessing.

Insincere Pursuit of Knowledge
`Abdullah ibn Mas`ud said, “What will be your situation when tribulation envelops you, in which a youngster will grow and the older one will become aged, and [the tribulation] will be taken as sunnah, such that if it is changed one day, it will be said, ‘This is wrong!’” Someone asked, “When is that?” He said, “When your trustworthy ones are few, and your leaders are many; when your jurists are few and your reciters are many, and knowledge is acquired for other than [the sake of] religion, and the world is sought through the deeds of the Hereafter.” [Darimi, al-Hakim]

Non-implementation of Knowledge
On the authority of Abu al-Darda’ : We were with the Messenger of Allah D, and he raised his eyes to the sky, and then said, “This is [almost] the time when knowledge will be snatched from people, such that they will not be capable of [practising] any of it.” [Tirmidhi (hasan gharib), al-Hakim, Darimi]

The adornment of mosques (already mentioned earlier) may also be a symptom of the decline in religious practice and knowledge, for it is disliked to decorate the inside of a mosque since it would distract the attention of worshippers. Further, it appears that the outward embellishment of mosques is accompanied by a decline in the internal spirituality - which in fact seems to be a general trend characterized by reduction of religion to little less than outward observances. One narrator of the above hadith from Abu al-Darda’ asked `Ubadah ibn al-Samit about it, and the latter replied, “Abu al-Darda’ spoke the truth. If you wish, I will relate to you the first [type of] knowledge which will be lifted from people : [it is] humility [in prayer]. The time is near when you will enter the community mosque, but you will not see a single man therein humble [in his prayer].”

Discarding of the Regulations of Divine Law
Matters eventually reach the stage where people, either though ignorance or in escapist pursuit of their lusts and whims, distort the shari`ah to legitimize the unlawful and to prohibit the wholesome.
“Verily, there will surely be among my nation people who will legitimize illicit sexual intercourse, the [wearing of] silk [for men], [the drinking of] wine, and musical instruments. And some people shall surely alight by a mountain . . . . and then Allah will destroy them by night, and cause the mountain to topple onto them, and others will be transmuted into apes and swine until the Day of Resurrection.” [Bukhari, Abu Dawud]

Such happenings have actually been indirectly alluded to in the Qur’an itself.
“They took their rabbis/priests and monks, as lords besides Allah.” [Qur’an, 9:31]
`Adiyy ibn Hatim, a Christian who then accepted Islam, heard this verse being recited, and remonstrated, ‘They did not worship them!’ The Messenger of Allah D replied, ‘Indeed. Surely, they (i.e. the religious leaders) prohibited the permissible for them (i.e. the people), and legitimized the prohibited for them, and [the people] followed them, and so that was their worship of them.” [Ahmad, Tirmidhi. After this the Prophet (may Allah bless him and his Household and grant them peace) invited `Adiyy to embrace Islam, and he accepted.]
And the Prophet (may Allah bless him and his Household and grant them peace) foretold, “Verily, you shall surely follow the pattern of those who were before you, span by span and cubit by cubit, to the extent that if they entered a lizard’s hole, you would follow them.” [Bukhari, Muslim, Ahmad]
“Verily, a portion of my nation shall surely legitimize alcohol, by [using for it] a name which they will call it [instead].” [Ahmad, Ibn Majah, al-Mukhtarah]
These again, are signs we have already started to witness. We see, for example, efforts to legitimize riba (interest/usury) by giving it a different name. Allah’s help is to be entreated.

Apostasy
Decline in knowledge provides fertile grounds for depraved persons to spread apostasy among the ignorant.
“The Hour will not be established before some tribes of my nation join the pagans, nor before idols will be worshipped. And, indeed there shall be in my nation thirty liars, each of them claiming that he is a prophet, but I am the last of the prophets; there is no prophet after me.” [Tirmidhi, al-Hakim]
How many such charlatans have we seen already! Starting with Musaylimah, through to Mirza Ghulam Ahmad of Qadian and Rashad Khalifah!

Corruption of Authority
We have already discussed how the decline in religious knowledge may lead to unfit people taking positions of religious authority. However, it is also among the Signs of the Hour that the holders of public office will become corrupt.

On the authority of Abu Hurayrah : While the Messenger of Allah D was talking, a Bedouin came and asked, “When is the Hour?” [The Prophet (may Allah bless him and his Household and grant them peace)] replied, “When trust is lost then await the Hour.” [The Bedouin] asked, “How will its loss occur?” He replied, “When affairs are rested with those unworthy of [handling] them, then await the Hour.” [Bukhari]

“There shall come upon people deceptive years, in which the liar will be regarded as truthful, the truthful one will be regarded as a liar, the treacherous one will be trusted, the trustworthy one will be mistrusted, and in which al-Ruwaybidah will speak.” Someone asked, “What is al-Ruwaybidah?” He said, “A paltry man speaking about the affair/business of the general public.” [Ahmad, Ibn Majah, al-Hakim]

The corrupt leaders are also expected to have numerous policemen and agents who assist them in their tyranny and oppression (as indicated in hadith 4, already mentioned above).
The Messenger of Allah (may Allah bless him and grant him peace) has said, “There are two categories of the People of the Fire [of Hell] whom I have not [yet] seen : [1] People with whips like cows’ tails, with which they shall beat people, and [2] Women who are clothed yet naked ....” [Muslim]

Such evil authorities, standing in the way of people doing good, have been seen in our times.
Shaykh `Abdullah `Azzam says, describing such conditions which exist in some Muslim countries,

“What then do you think about the millions of Muslims who are being humiliated with dreadful persecution, and are living the lives of cattle? They cannot repel attacks on their honor, lives and properties. Nay, such a man cannot even have his own way in growing his beard because it is an obvious sign of Islam. Nor, in fact, is he free to have his wife wear the long garments required by Islam because it is a crime for which he may be seized anywhere and at any time. Nor can he teach the Qur’an to three Muslim youths in the mosque because it is an illegal gathering according to the law of the ignorant. Nay, in some of the countries which are called Islamic, he cannot even have his wife cover her hair, nor can he prevent the intelligence officers from taking his daughter by the hand in the deep of night, under the cover of pitch-darkness, to wherever they wish. Can he refuse a command issued by the evil authorities, or will he comply and thereby provide a cheap sacrifice on the altar of the whims of this tyrant?

Are these millions not living lives of despicable subjugation, and do the angels not take their souls while they are wronging themselves? What then will be their reply when the angels ask them,
“What was the matter with you?”?
Will they not say,
“We were weak and oppressed in the land”?

Weakness is not an excuse before the Lord of the Worlds. In fact, it is a crime making the offender deserving of Hell. However, Allah has excused those of advanced years; the small children; and the women who neither find any scheme for liberation, nor know the path to the Land of Honor, nor are able to emigrate to the land of Islam or to arrive at the base for jihad.”
[`Abdullah `Azzam, “Join the Caravan"]

Killing
Hadith 4 has predicted that human blood will come to be taken lightly. This is in keeping with an increase in killing (which is indicated in other ahadith), for it is conceivable that under such circumstances, there will be little punitive action against the murderers.
“By He in Whose hand is my soul! The world shall not pass [away] before there comes upon people a day in which the murderer will not know why he has murdered, nor will the murdered one know why he has been killed.” [Muslim]
Another narration by Ahmad clarifies that this killing is amongst the Muslims, and that it will be on account of the people’s minds at that time being absent.

Decline in Ethics and Morals
Hadith 4 mentions the cutting of ties of kinship. The Gabriel hadith mentions that the slave-girl will give birth to her mistress, and one interpretation of this is that the child will behave as a mistress/master to its parents.

Other ahadith (some of which we have mentioned) tell of:
- people giving up their religion for paltry worldly provisions
- trust being lifted up, such that reliable people cannot be found
- adultery and wine-comsumption becoming more common and/or open
- appearance of obscenity and foul language
- greeting with salam becoming exclusive to those whom one recognizes
- giving of false testimony, and concealment of true testimony
- appearance of increased stinginess
- unscrupulousness in monetary matters, such that a person will not care whether he is taking his money from a legitimate source or not. [Bukhari] Another narration mentions interest (riba) becoming widespread, such that no-one will be totally free of its influence. [Ahmad]
- sanctions on the people of `Iraq [Bukhari]

The Approach of the Major Signs
We can consider that the minor signs lead up to the major signs, which in turn lead up to the end of this world. In the following hadith, the Prophet (may Allah bless him and his Household and grant them peace)gives us some idea of the succession of these events:

“Count six before the Hour :
[1] my death,
[2] then the conquest of Jerusalem,
[3] then a [wholesale] death which will take from you like qu`as al-ghanam [a disease which afflicts sheep, leaving them dead],
[4] then the abundance of wealth to the extent that a man will be given 100 dinar but remain unhappy [i.e. inflation],
[5] then a tribulation [which is such that] no house of the Arabs will remain without it entering,
[6] then a truce which will occur between you and the Romans, and then they will prove treacherous, such that they will come to you beneath 80 banners, under each banner 12,000 [men].” [Bukhari]

We will pick up from here, inshaAllah, next time. However, whether or not we witness all of these signs, we should realize that once we die - and the time of death is uncertain - the Hour has effectively come for us. Hence, we should make haste to correct our beliefs, repent from our sins, increase our knowledge of Islam, and strive to do more good deeds so as to strengthen our iman and draw nearer to Allah. May Allah save us from the worst of the trials and tribulations.

“Whoever fears sets out on his journey by night, and whoever travels by night reaches his destination. Indeed, the merchandise of Allah is expensive! Indeed, the merchandise of Allah is Heaven!” [Tirmidhi (hasan gharib)]

[Main references : 1- Fa-qad ja’a ashratuha, by Mahmud `Atiyyah Muhammad `Ali

2- `Umr Ummat al-Islam, by Amin Muhammad Jamal al-Deen

3- Preface to al-Kashmiri’s al-Tasreeh bi-ma Tawatara fi Nuzul al-Masih, by `Abdul-Fattah Abu Ghuddah]

From Suheil Laher's Islam Page