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yawma naṭwī s-samāʾa ka-ṭayyi s-sijilli li-l-kutubi ka-mā badaʾnā ʾawwala khalqin nuʿīduhū waʿdan ʿalaynā ʾinnā kunnā fāʿilīna
The day We shall roll up the heaven, like rolling of the scrolls [meant] for writings. We will bring it back just as We began the first creation—a promise [binding] on Us. [That] indeed We will do.
— Ali Quli Qarai
Surah Al-’Anbiya’ – Verse 104
104. “The Day when We will roll up the heaven as the rolling up of the scroll for writing; as We originated the first creation, (so) We shall get it return. (This is) a promise binding on Us; (and) surely We are to perform it.”
We understood in the previous verse that the true believers will not be grievous because of the ‘Great terror’. This verse describes ‘that Day of terror’, and in fact, it illustrates the cause of that horror. Concerning the time of its occurrence, it says:
There is a delicate simile in this verse about the destruction and rolling up of the scroll of the world of existence at the end of the world. At the present time, this scroll has been opened and all its designs and lines can be read and each of them has been settled in a proper place. But when the command of Resurrection comes, this scroll, with all its lines and designs, will be rolled up. Then the verse adds implying that there is no problem and hardship for the Great Power of Allah to return it and He will do it in the same way that He originated it at the beginning.
The verse says:
Then, at the end of the verse, Allah says:
However, some of the authentic Islamic narrations indicate that the objective meaning of ‘return’, in this verse, is the return of creation in its first form so that human beings will return to life, barefooted and naked, in the same shape that they were at the beginning of their creation; and this is one of the features of the return of creation in its initiating form. Imam Amir-ul-Mu’mineen Ali (as) said:
“Man will be raised bare in Resurrection”; and then he (as) recited this verse, which says:
The Arabic word /sijill/ originally was applied for a piece of stone on which something was written; but later gradually it has been used for the sheets of paper on which some materials are written. The sign of the appearance of Resurrection with the initial creation of the world has repeatedly referred to in the Holy Qur’an. Once it says:
In another verse it says:
The objective of ‘the heaven’, mentioned in this verse, is all the heavens, because in another occurrence the Qur’an has said:
Footnotes