A believer may see his Lord in a dream in various forms, according to the degree of his faith and certainty. If his faith is sound, he sees Him only in a beautiful form; if his faith is deficient, he sees what corresponds to his faith. A dream vision is to be understood differently from an actual vision while awake. It calls for “interpretation and explanation” because it contains symbolic representations of realities.

Some people may also experience visions while awake similar to those experienced by someone asleep: they see with their hearts something like what a sleeping person sees. Certain realities may also become manifest to a person, who witnesses them with his heart. All of this occurs in this world.

Sometimes a person is so overwhelmed by what his heart witnesses and his senses take in that he thinks he has seen it with his physical eyes, until he awakens and realizes that it was a dream. At other times, he knows even while dreaming that it is a dream. Likewise, some devout worshippers experience an inward witnessing that so overwhelms them that they lose awareness of their senses. They then mistake it for seeing with their eyes. They are mistaken in this. Any devout worshipper, whether of earlier or later times, who says that he has seen his Lord with his physical eyes is mistaken, by the consensus of the people of knowledge and faith.

Indeed, believers will see Allah with their eyes in Paradise, and people will also see Him on the plains of the Resurrection, as established in the mass-transmitted hadiths from the Prophet, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, who said:

“You will surely see your Lord as you see the sun at midday with no clouds obscuring it, and as you see the full moon on a clear night with no clouds obscuring it.”