Qiyamah

Belief in carnal material resurrection and in a Judgement Day is a fundamental tenet of faith in Islam, and is required of every Muslim. According to this belief, at an unknown time, when people least expect it, God will give permission for the Qiyâmah to begin. The world will be destroyed, or folded, and the dead will rise from their graves and gather in wait to be judged for their deeds. Accounts of judgement day in the primary texts of Islam are prolific and the summary that follows is necessarily incomplete.

The trials and tribulations of that day are given in both the primary texts of Islam, the Qur'an and the Hadith, as well as in the commentaries of the expositors and scholarly authorities such as al-Ghazali, ibn-Kathir, and many others, who explain them in detail.

Qiyamah

Either during this wait, or during the judgement itself, people will encounter their deeds or suffer punishments for their deeds in material, personified form. For instance, artists would be made to face their own creations and challenged to infuse each with a soul.

Idols will assert that only God is Lord, and that they were wrongfully worshipped. The Qur'an and Hadith explicitly state that the prophet Jesus will also deny that he claimed he was Lord.

The personified appearance of things that are not normally considered anthropomorphic is a recurrent motif in the reports regarding the hereafter. For instance, in the grave one is said to face either a reassuring man, (his or her good deeds) or a foul-looking creature (his or her bad deeds). Again, this recurs in the subject of the Qiyâmah. For instance, the Qu'ran appears as an anthropomorphic being that greets those who loved it in their lives and offers them some solace. In the same vein, accounts in the primary Islamic literature mention that at some point (perhaps after creatures are confined to either paradise or hell) Death will be brought forth and slain, and a proclamation that there is no more death will be sounded.

The Qu'ran mentions the duration of the day of judgement as 50,000 years. Humans will be so fearful on this "day" that the prophets themselves will repeatedly address God with the phrase sallim, sallim, or spare, spare — that is, "spare your followers, O God." People will beseech the prophets to intercede on their behalf, but one by one, the prophets will decline to do so, and will point to the prophet Muhammad, who will intercede on his nation's behalf.

Believers will be led by the prophet Muhammad to a vast basin or lake-fount called al-kawthar الكوثر, where their thirst will be sated with a white-colored drink that tastes like sweetened milk; whosoever drinks it, never thirsts thereafter. In one hadith al-kawthar is said to be a river of paradise (al-bukhari,book 76,hadith 583.) sahih al-bokhari, in book 76 (the book of tenderness), the chapter on the basin contains at least 14 hadiths about it.

Islam also addresses the question of whether believers will be able to see God on that day. According to one or more Hadith classified as sahîh (trustworthy), God will reveal a "leg" or "shin" for the believers. Again, classical commentators prefer the safe route of interpreting that Hadith as neither literal nor figurative, but most if not all agree that it answers the question in the affirmative: believers will see God. Another Hadith states that believers will be able to see their Lord, just as we are able to see the sun or the moon in the sky. When God reveals Himself to the faithful, a Hadith states that those who during their life would not pray of their own free will will be made to fall on their backs.

During judgement, a man's or a woman's own book of deeds will be opened, and they will be apprised of every action they did and every word they spoke. Actions taken during childhood are not judged. The account of deeds is so detailed that the man or woman will wonder at how comprehensive the account is, that even minor and trivial deeds are included. If one denies a deed he or she committed, or refuses to acknowledge it, his or her own body parts will testify against him or her (for example, the hands, feet, legs, eyes, and tongue will testify to the deed being denied).

Throughout judgement, however, the underlying principle is that of a complete and perfect justice administered by God. The accounts of judgement are also replete with the emphasis that God is merciful and forgiving, and that mercy and forgiveness will be granted on that day insofar as it is merited.

This is similar to some Protestant theologies that state that salvation is by the grace of God, and not by deeds. Islam, however, emphasizes that grace does not conflict with perfect justice.

Animals are also judged, but separately, and they are avenged from humans and other animals. They are then made to perish. The animals (or other creatures) in paradise are thus different than the animals of our world.

There is indication also that nations are collectively called to account for their deeds. And there are Hadiths that indicate that on judgement day people are made to join the races or communities with which they associated themselves, which points to a definition of society in ideological — not racial — terms.

Each man and woman, after judgement, is made to cross over a deep abyss, whence the flames of hell leap up, on a thorny bridge so thin that it cannot be seen. The bridge is called al-Sirât (الصراط).

The believers and those destined for paradise are able to cross quickly and safely, whereas others fall off this hair-thin bridge into hell.

Concerning the matter of reward or Heaven (paradise) and punishment Hell, there is the subject of the Intercession (الشفاعة). Hadiths classified as sahih state that the prophet Muhammad will be allowed to intercede on the behalf of his nation. Furthermore, a believer will be allowed to plead for members of his family and for his loved ones. Throughout the discourse regarding the ultimate destiny, the consistent tenet is that being sent to paradise or to hell is a matter in God's hands alone (or, in Christian parlance, a matter determined by grace). God is thus the ultimate arbiter and judge as to who remains in hell and who is rescued from it. The particulars of this subject are far beyond the scope of this article.

In one Hadith, it is related that after the Intercession of the prophet Muhammad (SAWS,) God himself intercedes, ordering his angels to fetch out of hell any who sincerely professed that "there is no God but Allah" during their lives, who have this shahâda (testament) in their hearts, repeatedly until the angels are ordered to return and find anyone with even an atom's measure of goodness in his or her heart, to rescue him or her from hell. Those who have associated others with God in worship, or have ascribed Godhood to other than God are not rescued from hell but
remain in it eternally. After the Intercession, life for humans resumes, either in paradise (al-firdaus) or in hell. There is no specification of how long those who are rescued from hell must first spend there.

Accounts in the hadith

Of the nine major collections, only two contain exclusively sahîh (literally true, correct) hadîth - those hadîth which muslim scholarly consensus accepts as having the highest degree of authenticity and are thus trustworthy. One is compiled by imam al-Bokharî, and the other compiled by imam Muslim; they are thus known as Sahîh al-Bokharî and Sahîh Muslim.

al-Bukhâri's collection of hadith sahih al-bokhâri alone contains at least 221 hadiths referring to the day of resurrection.
What follows are some of those reports taken only from the two collections of sahih hadith, i.e., these are Sahîh al-bukhârî and Sahîh Muslim.