Eighth Principle: Concerning the Acts of Allah
Everything that exists in the universe is His creation—exalted is He. He has no partner, no co-creator; He alone is the single Creator. Whatever He brings into being of fatigue, illness, poverty, incapacity, or ignorance issues from His justice. Injustice cannot be attributed to any of His acts, for the unjust is the one who disposes of what belongs to another, whereas the Creator—magnified be He—acts only within what is His own. No proprietor exists alongside Him; everything that has been and all that will be are His possession. He is the Owner without equal or partner. No one may object to Him with a “why” or a “how”; the judgment and the command in all His works belong to Him alone, and mankind has nothing but submission, reflection upon His handiwork, and contentment with His decree.
Ninth Principle: Concerning the Hereafter
The Exalted fashioned the world from two components: body and spirit. He made the body a dwelling place for the spirit so that it might gather provision for the life to come. For every spirit He fixed a definite term within the body; when that term ends—neither increased nor diminished—the spirit is separated from the body. When the deceased is laid in his grave, his spirit is returned to his body to answer the interrogation of Munkar and Nakir, two formidable beings who ask, “Who is your Lord? Who is your Prophet?” If he falters and cannot reply, they punish him and fill his grave with serpents and scorpions.
On the Day of Resurrection—the day of reckoning, recompense, scrutiny, and requital—the spirit is once more restored to the body, the records are unrolled, and deeds are displayed before all created beings. Each person looks into his book, sees his works, witnesses his actions, and learns the measure of his obedience and disobedience. His deeds are then weighed on the Balance of deeds, after which he is commanded to cross the bridge (sirāt). The sirāt is finer than a hair and sharper than a sword. Everyone who, in this world, kept to the straight and sound way and trod the clear path will cross the sirāt and pass over it with ease and relief, but whoever was not upon praiseworthy conduct and righteous deeds