Ahmadiyyat or The True Islam — Page 313
313 lessness and weakness in which it begins to adjust itself to the conditions of this life, so after death the human soul passes through various stages and experiences. The Holy Quran uses the same word to describe the stage through which the human soul passes immedi- ately after death, as it employs for the womb. Hence the first stage through which the soul passes after death is the stage of the womb in which, like the child in the womb, it undergoes a development in accord with the mode of life led by it in this world; and as, at a certain stage in the womb the child develops a soul, so the human soul after passing through certain experiences after death develops a new soul which possesses far higher and finer and more delicate faculties and percep- tions than the soul from which it emanates. The old soul then serves this new soul as a body and man becomes able to perceive things through his new physical senses which he could perceive formerly only through the soul, for, the new body with which man is invested is as fine and delicate of perception as the soul was in this world. In truth it is that very soul in a new transformation. Another process then commences which may be com- pared to the stage of birth of a child. This is called the resurrection of the body. It signifies that man is now equipped with a new soul and a new body which fit him for the new life before him, as the child is fitted with a body and soul in the womb. At this stage man emerges from the stage of the womb, i. e. , the tomb. The next stage is called the Day of Resurrection and may be compared to the stage of infancy. In it the