The book of God signifies knowledge. As to the last judgment and the resurrection of bodies, intelligent men said, that each atom of the atoms of a human body, which are dispersed, will be all collected on the day of resurrection, and restored to life, and at this hour there will be no question put about any thing done, but what is come to us from the prophets and saints, this we must believe. The learned say besides, that the question is here about the soul, which on the day of resurrection returns (to its origin), and this substance is pure, and does not require to be suitable to any dimension, color, or place, but is independent of all these, and on that account fit for sciences and knowledge of all things; its extreme excellence is to be able to collect for review all things from the first origin to the last extremity, and to know that whenever it attains that degree of perfection, it has returned to the place of its origin; and this is the knowledge of purity, which is remote from the defilement and mixture of what is material. The learned assert besides, that the night of power, “the night on which the Koran was sent down,” refers to the beginning, and the day of resurrection to the place to which one returns; because the nature of night is to conceal things of which few may have information, and the nature of day is to bring to view things of which all may take notice. Further, the whole of the notions and powers of primitive creation is contained in the knowledge of God, who is understood under the name of “primitive, permanent, and predestinator.” Every body possesses not this knowledge; it was then on account of the belief that the predestinations were concealed in it, that “the night of power” was said to be “primitive,” and as in the place to which one returns (that is at the resurrection) every thing concealed shall become manifest, and every one be informed of it, on account of this belief, this place was referred to “day.” As on this day, all are to rise from the tomb of the body, and to awake from the sleep of heedlessness, it was called “the resurrection.”
According to the learned, Kâbah (the square temple at Mecca) is an emblem of the sun, on which account it is right to worship it; and the well Zem zem[123] signifies likewise “the great luminary,” as Hakím Khákání said relatively to both:
“O Kábah, thou traveller of the heaven!
O Zem zem, thou fire of the world!”
Hajer ul ásvad, “the black stone at Mecca,” represents the body of Venus, which on the border of the heavens is a star of the planets. Some have interpreted the resurrection of the bodies in the sense of the learned, who referred it to the revolution of the heavens, and to the influences of the stars upon the terrestrial globe.
“Every external form of things, and every object which disappeared,
Remains stored up in the storehouse of fate;
When the system of the heavens returns to its former order,
God, the All-Just, will bring them forth from the veil of mystery.”
Another poet says: