Question:
Is it true that Day of Judgement is near 1500 Hijri or I have heard that ala Hazrat sayings that it is near 1900 Hijri and appearance of Imam Mahdi near 1837 Hijri. which one is most correct ? Is UAE best country to settle up to appearance of Mahdi?
Answer:
From the suhbat of Mawlana Shaykh Hisham Kabbani on 19 November, 2010:
In tafseer Surat ad-Duha, in Ruh al-Bayaan, it is mentioned in a hadith,
ان استقامت امتى فلها يوم وان لم تستقم فلها نصف يوم
In istaqaamat ummatee falahaa yawm wa in lam tastaqim falahaa nisfa yawm,
If this nation has not been corrupted, Allah will give it one day of life, and if it is corrupt then Allah will give it the life of half-a-day.
وَإِنَّ يَوْمًا عِندَ رَبِّكَ كَأَلْفِ سَنَةٍ مِّمَّا تَعُدُّونَ
wa inna yawma inda rabbika ka-alfi sannatin mimma ta`udoon
Verily a Day in the sight of thy Lord is like a thousand years of your reckoning. (22:47)
Allah gave the ummah one day that is a thousand years long, as one heavenly day is a thousand years of dunya. So Allah gave the ummah a thousand years; and if it is not good, then the ummah begins to fall down. And now we are seeing the ummah is falling down since the time of Sayyidina Ahmad as-Sirhindi, Mujaddad alf ath-thani. Everything has not been correct; he brought it back Islamically. And then the hadith says, “but if the ummah is not going to be on istiqamah, on the straight path, they will have half-a-day,” meaning 500 years. Now it is 1431 AH and most of the ahadeeth Prophet (s) predicted have come true, so we have only 59 years left for all the alamats to appear, and Allah knows best, but this is the tafseer. Allah (swt) is giving an oath by the light of that ummah, which is 1500 years, the ummah which is the best ummah, because in the time of Prophet (s) everything was perfect. Then, ummat an-Nabi was following Islam as Allah (swt) wanted.
As for where to settle, Mawlana Shaykh Hisham Kabbani says in the book Approach of Armageddon: An Islamic Perspective in the chapter “Sham and the Abdal”:
The Prophet (s) said:
عن ابن حوالة أنه قال: قال رسول الله صلى الله عليه وسلم سيصير الأمر إلى أن تكون جنود مجندة جند بالشام وجند باليمن وجند بالعراق فقال ابن حوالة خر لي يا رسول الله إن أدركت ذاك قال عليك بالشام فإنه خيرة الله من أرضه يجتبي إليه خيرته من عباده فإن أبيتم فعليكم بيمنكم واسقوا من غدركم فإن الله عز وجل قد توكل لي بالشام وأهله. ُ(رواه أبو داود و أحْمد في مسْنده)
Go to Shām, for it is the cream of Allāh’s lands on this earth. Allāh has chosen the best of his creation to reside there… If you do not wish to go there, then go to your Yemen and drink from its streams. Allāh has vouchsafed for me the safety of Shām and its people.[1]
Imām Nawawī, in his book Fadā’il Shām (The Merits of Shām), mentioned forty hadiths of the Prophet r praising the immense merits of Shām. In his book The Importance of Living in Shām, al-‘Izz Ibn ‘Abd al-Salām said that 10,000 Companions went to Shām due to the recommendation of the Prophet (s).
عَنْ عَبْدِ اللهِ بْنِ العاصق قال قال النَّبيّ صلّى اللهُ عَلَيْهِ و سلِّم لا ليأتينَّ على الناسِ زَمانٌ لا يَبْقى على الأرْضِ مُؤْمِن إلا لحق بِالشام (حاكم)
‘Abd Allāh Ibn ‘Amr Ibn al-’Ās t related that the Prophet (s) said, “There will come a time for humanity when every believer will certainly go to Shām.”[2]
That is, the believer will leave everything and go to Shām.
عن أبي الدرداء قال: قال رسول الله صلى الله عليه وسلم “بينا أنا نائم رأيت عمود الكتاب احتمل من تحت رأسي فظننت أنه مذهوب به فأتبعته بصري فعمد به إلى الشام ألا وإن الإيمان حين تقع الفتن بالشام
(رواه البزار ورجاله رجال الصحيح غير محمد بن عامر الأنطاكي وهو ثقة)
The Prophet(s) said:
Indeed when the trials and tribulations befall (when the Dajjāl appears), safety (or faith) is in Shām.[3]
The Anti-Christ will cover all the world, but he cannot enter three places: Makka, Madīna and Shām. Shām is protected by angels, and it is the place where the Resurrection will take place.
الشامُ أرْضُ المَحْشَرِ و المَنْشَرِ
Abū Dharr (r) related that the Prophet (s) said, “The land of Shām is the place of Resurrection and Judgment.”[4]
[1] Sunan Abū Dāwūd. Musnad Āhmad. Sahīh Ibn Hibbān (16:295). Hākim, Mustadrak (4:510). Bayhaqī, Sunan al-kubrā (9:179):
‘Alaykum bish-shāmi fa innahā safwatu bilādillāh. Yaskunuhā khīratuhu min khalqihi. Fa man abā fal yalhaq bi-yumnihi. Wal yasqī min ghudrihi. Fa-inna Allāha ‘azza wa jalla takaffal lī shāmi wa āhlih.
[2] Hākim (4:457). Sahīh on the conditions of Sahīh Bukhārī and Sahīh Muslim. “Layatīyanna ‘alā an-nāsi zamanun la yabqā ‘alā al-ardi mu’minun illa lāhiqa bi ash-shām.”
[3] Tabarānī. “Alā wa inna al-īmānu hīna taqa‘u al-fitan bi ash-Shām.”
[4] Āhmad, Musnad. Ibn Mājah. Albānī, Sahīh al-jami‘a #3620. “Ash-shāmu ard al-mahshar wal-manshari.”
Taher Siddiqui
