Allah further informed them that He would inevitably put both of them and their progeny to the test: whoever believes and acts righteously will end up in a state better than the one he first enjoyed, whereas whoever rejects the truth and turns away will ultimately meet everlasting misery and unending punishment.

He also warned their descendants about Satan, saying, “O children of Adam, let not Satan tempt you as he drove your parents out of the Garden, stripping them of their garment to expose their nakedness. Indeed, he and his tribe see you from where you cannot see them” (al-Aʿrāf: 27). In place of the garment that Satan stripped from their parents, Allah granted humanity clothing that covers nakedness and provides outward beauty in worldly life, and—far superior still—the garment of taqwā (God-consciousness), a covering for the heart and soul woven from faith, sincerity, penitence, the adornment of every noble trait, and the abandonment of every base one.

Thereafter Allah spread forth from Adam and his wife many men and women, dispersed them across the earth, and appointed them as its stewards so that He might see how they would act.

Benefits drawn from this story—touching on creed, law, ethics, and etiquette:

– First: This monumental story is mentioned by Allah in His Book in numerous clear passages, free of doubt or ambiguity. It is among the greatest narratives on which all the messengers are agreed; every heavenly scripture affirms it, and all the followers of the prophets, early and late, have believed in it.

– Yet in these recent times a pernicious, heretical faction has surfaced. They deny all that the messengers brought, deny the very existence of the Creator, and acknowledge no branch of knowledge save the natural sciences to which their limited understanding has led them.

– On the basis of this doctrine—which is, by any religious or rational measure, the farthest doctrine from the truth—they have denied Adam and Eve and all that Allah and His Messenger have related concerning them, alleging instead that the human being was once an animal, an ape or something akin to an ape, that gradually evolved into its present form!