Islam its meaning for modern man

It is characteristic of the Quran that wherever an attribute of God is mentioned it has reference to the subject matter of the context. It is not without significance that the attribute “Lord of Great Ascents” is mentioned in connection with this warning of a severe chastisement. The nature of the chastisement is described in the succeeding verses, but the mention of this attribute shows that the chastisement will have an element of great heights, or graduated ascents, about it. The skies becoming like molten copper would indicate, among other things, the generation of intense heat. Mountains becoming like flakes of wool would signify tremendous impacts which would blow up and scatter mountains. Stripping off of the skin even to the extremities of the body would appear to point to some of the effects of radiation. The swiftness with which the horror might spread is indicated by its overtaking those who turn back and seek to escape.

The concluding verses of the eighteenth chapter, to which the Prophet drew attention, run as follows: “On that day We shall leave some of them to surge against others, and the trumpet will be sounded.

Then shall We gather them all together. On that day We shall present the torment, face to face, to those who believe not⎯those whose eyes are under a veil so as not to heed My warnings, and they cannot afford even to hear. Do those who believe not think that they 355