PERFECT RELIGION 55
delight . . . with goblets and ewers and a cup of flowing wine; their brows ache not from it, nor fails the sense; . . . theirs shall be the houris . . . ever virgins." * The greatest spiritual pleasure in heaven is the sight of the face of God. But the ideal virtues are not glorified in the Koran in vivid and concrete imagery.
The torments of hell are portrayed in lurid language. There are seven gates, and each gate is strongly guarded. Its terrifically hot fires burn with fuel consisting of sinners and stones. Its inhabitants are given nothing to drink but liquid pus, and their garments are burning pitch.
Men will know when the Day of Judgment is approaching because the sun will rise in the west; there will be a terrific world war between the opposing hosts of Gog and Magog; the Antichrist will come, and Jesus as a leader of the Moslems will descend from heaven, alighting first on the minaret of the ancient mosque at Damascus. The Mahdi, 2 too, will come, and will eventually lead Islam to universal victory.
6. "/ believe in the predestination by Allah of good and evil." This is the last article of the Islamic creed, and in it we find the key to much of the course that history and human life have taken in Moslem lands. While it is impossible to prove from Koranic
J. M. RodwelPs translation of the Koran, pp. 66-67. 2 Literally, the Directed One; a ruler who will appear upon the earth in the last days. See Chapter Eight, p. 151.
