But there is...

But there is, in the hereafter, a severe penalty (for the wrongdoers), and [there is also] God's forgiveness and (His) good pleasure (for His devotees).

And what is the life of this world but goods and chattels of deception?" (Qur'an, 57:20) You can see that He, the Praised One, divides material life into five parts as if the latter revolve round these steps: Sporting Diversion Adornment and Beautification Boasting Accumulation of Wealth and Offspring Scholars believe that each of these parts occupies a measure of man's lifetime then thrusts to the next part according to the completion of his age and the strengthening of his energies.

Perhaps each one of them consumes eight years of one's lifetime; the fifth part continues with him thereafter up to the conclusion of his life and does not part with him till death. This sacred verse, moreover, compares the life which is empty of values to a green plant the greenness and goodness of which do not last: Soon, the green plant turns yellow from which one is repelled.

The similitude of one who is drowned in the quagmire of matter is like this same plant: One starts his life with greenness and goodness, then he settles in the end as a stench in a deep pit of the earth save one who conjoined his material life with a spiritual life which does not come to a conclusion by his death and the departure of his soul from his body.

The Holy Quran also portrays the material life in another way: It says, "The unbelievers' deeds are like a mirage in sandy deserts which are parched with thirst [and which he] mistakes for water; until when he comes to it, he finds it to be nothing. But he finds Allah (ever) with him, and Allah will pay him his account, and Allah is swift in reckoning" (Qur'an, 24:39). Material life, in its freshness, manifests itself as a realistic thing that has elegance and goodness.

It lures one just like a thirsty person is lured by a mirage. When he reaches the end of his lifetime, he comes to know that it was nothing realistic with which his heart would feel comfortable. Human life undertakes the sound path if it interacts with the spiritual side so that religion, values and ethics may assume a lofty status in his life just as his material life has this anticipated status.

This reality, that is, one's attitude towards religion, manifests itself if we familiarize ourselves with two matters: What is religion? What is its reality? What is its role in man's life? What is Religion?