The Garden is from Allah's Justice

Everyone Will Receive the Return for what He Has Done in this World:

In the Qur’an, Allah reveals the purpose of creation:

He Who created death and life to test which of you is best in action… (Surat al-Mulk: 2)

In another verse, we are asked the following:

Did you suppose that We created you for amusement and that you would not return to Us? (Surat al-Muminun: 115)

As long as we are in this world, we are responsible for obeying the Qur’an, seeking Allah’s approval in everything we think and do, acting according to the Sunnah of the Messenger of Allah, listening to our consciences, living good lives and doing good works. Despite this evident truth, those who live their lives with no regard for the purpose of creation set completely different goals for themselves. However, a record of our works is being kept so that everyone may receive the appropriate reward in the Hereafter for everything he has done and said. Allah, exalted is He, even knows every thought that passes through our minds. As Allah tells us in the Qur’an, everyone will certainly receive the reward for what he has done: “… You will be questioned about what you did” (Surat an-Nahl: 93), “All have ranks according to what they did…” (Surat al- An‘am: 132) However, people of deep knowledge of the deen understand that even if their actions seem good to those who are disbelievers, they are of no use to them as long as they have no iman. Some of the verses in the Qur’an that speak about this matter are as follows:

On the Day that each self finds the good it did, and the evil it did, present there in front of it, it will wish there were an age between it and then… (Surah Al ‘Imran: 30)

What is with you runs out but what is with Allah goes on for ever. Those who were steadfast will be recompensed according to the best of what they did. Anyone who acts rightly, male or female, being a mumin, We will give them a good life and We will recompense them according to the best of what they did. (Surat an-Nahl: 96-97)

Allah sees everything that happens; He hears every conversation and whisper; and He knows everything that we do. No secret can be kept from Him. We must be aware that He is at every moment and in every way closer to us than our jugular veins, that He hears every conversation, knows everything that is in our hearts, and sees everything that we do and everything that we see. In the world to come Allah will make it clear that what confronts human beings from Allah will be “something they did not reckon with.” (Surat az-Zumar: 47) In the world to come, we will receive the reward for everything we have done in public and in solitude, for every word we have uttered, and for things we perhaps thought would remain hidden. This is Allah’s eternal justice. This is revealed in the following verse of the Qur’an:

Everyone will be ranked according to what they did. We will pay them in full for their actions and they will not be wronged. (Surat al-Ahqaf: 19)

There Are Ranks in the Garden:

We understand from the Qur’an that people who enter the Garden will be rewarded with a rank corresponding to their submission to Allah.

They have different ranks with Allah… (Surah Al ‘Imran: 163)

Of course, no matter what rank a person enjoys in the Garden, he will be content with it because Allah has promised happiness for all His slaves in the Garden. Our Lord has revealed that He will be pleased with His faithful slaves when they enter the Garden and they will be pleased with Him (Surat al-Bayyina: 8). However, just as in this world everyone takes a different pleasure and delight from the same blessings, so in the Garden the degree of pleasure taken from the blessings there may be different. Allah knows best. For example, everyone enjoys looking at a beautiful view but, those whose hearts are closer to Allah and who more greatly appreciate His majesty, may derive greater pleasure from these blessings. In one verse of the Qur’an, Allah describes the qualities of those slaves who will be worthy of high rank:

Those who have iman and make hijra and strive in the Way of Allah with their wealth and themselves have a higher rank with Allah. They are the ones who are victorious. (Surat at-Tawba: 20)

We are also told about the ranks of the Garden in the hadith:

There are a hundred levels in the Garden, any one of which encompasses all the worlds. (Ahmad Diya ad-Din al- Kamushkhanawi, Ramuz al-Ahadith, vol. 1, p. 125/8)

The people of the Garden will see the people of the highest ranks above them just as you see the pearly stars ghaabir on the horizons from the east to the west, because of the differences of rank between them. (Sahih al-Bukhari; Sahih Muslim)

And the Garden will be brought up close to those with taqwa [piety], not far away: (Surah Qaf: 31)

Again in the hadith it is revealed that the highest of these degrees of the Garden is Firdaws:

In the Garden there are a hundred degrees Allah has prepared for those who strive in the way of Allah. What is between two degrees is as much as what is between the heaven and the earth. So when you ask Allah, ask Him for Firdaws because it is the best of the Garden and the highest of the Garden. [The narrator said, “I think that it is”] above the Throne of the All-Merciful, and from it the rivers of the Garden flow out. (Sahih al- Bukhari)

A person takes his own particular pleasure from every degree of the Garden. But a person in the Garden does not begrudge the pleasure enjoyed by a person in a higher degree. In the Qur’an, Allah says that believers will be “well-pleased” in the Garden (Surat al-Fajr: 28): “they are pleased with Him”(Surat al-Bayyina: 8) and that they “know no sorrow” there (Surah Al ‘Imran: 170). Likewise, another hadith describes the abundance of blessings enjoyed by the People of the Garden in every degree:

The least of the People of the Garden in rank is the one who will have eighty thousand servants and seventy two wives, and for whom will be set up a dome of pearls, aquamarine and rubies similar in dimensions to the distance between Jabiyah and San’a. (Sunan Ibn Majah; at-Tirmidhi)

...and the Forerunners, the Forerunners. Those are the Ones Brought Near in Gardens of Delight. (Surat al-Waqi'a: 10-12)

The following hadith speaks about the degrees in the Garden:

The least of the people of the Garden in degree will be the one who gazes at his gardens, his wives, his servants, his couches stretching for the distance travelled in a thousand year. The noblest of them to Allah will be one who gazes on His jamal morning and evening. (Surat al-Qiyama: 21-22) (At-Tirmidhi)

Bediuzzaman Said Nursi said that a person can hope to attain a high degree in the Garden only on the basis of his iman:

With the light of faith, a person rises to the highest level in the Garden, and assumes a value worthy of the Garden. (Death and Youthfulness, p. 435)

A sincere Muslim must always make effort towards being worthy of the highest rank in Allah’s Presence in the Garden. A person who has perfected faith and desires above all to be close to Allah is pleasing to Him.

The Companions of the Fire and the Companions of the Garden are not the same. It is the Companions of the Garden who are the victors. (Surat al-Hashr: 20)