Revelation, Rationality, Knowledge & Truth — Page 632
UNVEILING OF THE ‘UNSEEN' BY THE QURAN – A HISTORIC PERSPECTIVE. And when the mountains will be made to move. ² 26. Mountains in Islamic terminology mean great worldly powers. There are many verses in the Holy Quran which mention mountains with the same connotation. So the third verse which speaks of the mountains is in fact the verse with which we begin our study to understand what would happen in the latter days. After the initial decline of Islam, a starless night would fall to be followed by the dawn of a day which would not to be the dawn of Islam. Great material powers would not only rise but move their influence widely from territory to territory, from continent to continent and bring under their domination country after country. That is how mountains in their sense can move and they did move. The moving of the mountains can also be understood in other ways, a discussion to which we shall turn later. Now that we have begun to re-visualize the great changes which according to this Surah of the Quran were destined to take place in that age, we take up the subject bit by bit and category by category in accordance with the verses as they follow. . While on the subject of movements, the implication of the fifth verse can be easily understood. It reads: وَإِذَا الْعِشَارُ عُطَّلَتْ * 81:5 when the ten month pregnant she-camels will be abandoned. 27. In this context the prophecy of the she-camels being abandoned can evidently be understood to mean that better, faster and more powerful means of transport will have been invented. The scenario of the mountains moving from place to place, great powers spreading their influence from 592