All Humans Had A Past Life

Salaamun alaykum, dear readers!

This is a sequel to our previous article titled: The Righteous Do Not “Die”, They Go Straight to Heaven.

In that article, the key takeaways were:

The Quran says the believers experienced only one death, but disbelievers experienced two deaths.

The Quran defines death as being a state of unconsciousness that is exactly like sleep. When the life of the disbeliever is terminated on Earth, he or she will undergo this sleep-like state. But a believer will be alive, fully conscious, and in Heaven.

On Judgement Day, the disbelievers will be resurrected, and they would think they were dead for a day or part of a day. This is almost like when we are asleep or under anesthesia, we are unaware of the passage of time.

Thus, this “first death” that all of humanity went through was the death that ended our previous existence. All of humanity collectively experienced this death.

During the first death, before we humans are reborn on Earth, we are fully unconscious and totally unaware of the billions of years that pass by until we are born here in this world. Thus, the second death will be a similar experience for the disbelievers until the Day of Resurrection.

What Is The Previous Existence?

In order to explain the previous existence of people, it helps to understand what the jinn are, and why they are here.

The Quran repeatedly brings up the story of Iblis (known in Christianity and Islam as the Satan, or devil) to teach us certain things. He disobeyed God’s command to prostrate to Adam, then was sentenced to Hell until he begged for respite. God gave him that respite (a chance to redeem himself) by allowing him to stay on the dunya (our physical World) until Judgment Day when God will decide the outcome of whether he has redeemed himself.

But Iblis wholeheartedly rejected redemption, and is an enemy to the human being forever. We know this because this story tells us the nature of even the closest of God’s servants as those who are willing followers, including the angels.

Angels Have Free Will

We Muslims believe that angels have no free will of their own, and just do exactly as they are told at all times without question. That is evidently not true, as the angels expressed some skepticism when God (before the creation of Adam and his wife) announced His plan to put on Earth Adam as a “khalifa” or ruler, along with his wife as his companion.

The angels not only seemed to question God’s decision, but dared speculate about the future to God, predicting that Adam somehow will spread corruption and bloodshed on Earth.

God, for His part, seemed okay with that, as indicated by how He did not punish them, but used Adam to teach them a moralistic lesson that God knows something regarding His decision that they do not.

This does not, by any means, portray angels as without wills of their own, robotically incapable of doing other than what God tells them to. It’s quite the opposite.

[2:30-33] And when your Lord said to the angels, “Indeed, I will place a ruler in the earth.” They said, “Will You place therein one who will spread corruption therein and shed blood, while we sublime You with Your praise and sanctify You?” He said, “Indeed, I know what you do not know.” And He taught Adam all the names, then displayed them upon the angels, then said, “Inform Me of the names of these, if you have been truthful ones.” They said, “The sublimity of You, there is no knowledge for us except what You have taught us. Indeed, You are the Knowledgeable, the Wise.” He said, “O Adam, inform them of their names.” So when he informed them of their names, He said, “Did I not say to you, ‘Indeed, I know the unseen of the heavens and the earth, and I know what you disclose and what you used to conceal.’?”

Iblis Was Previously an Angel

Having established this fact about angels, we now discuss the status of Iblis in the Quran.

He is known as the devil (as-Shaytan) in the Quran, and his Biblical equivalent is Satan.

Most Muslims believe that Iblis was always a jinn. But contrary to established doctrine, however, Iblis was not a jinn in the beginning. Verses 2:34 and 15:30-31 (and a few others) discuss how God commanded the angels to prostrate, then they all did except Iblis, who disobeyed that command.

[2:34] And when We said to the angels, “Prostrate to Adam,” they then prostrated, except Iblis. He refused and was arrogant, and he became among the disbelievers.

Logically speaking, if God directed a command to the angels, how would Iblis have disobeyed that command if he were not an angel to start with? He would not have disobeyed God if he were a jinn to begin with.

It may be contended that this is a feature of the Arabic language, that if a majority is called upon to do something in a setting, this applies also to the minority.

But this assumes that God was speaking Arabic to the angels, instead of the Arabic being a translation of the original discourse in the unknown language. There is no proof that the command for the angels to prostrate to God was spoken in Arabic.

Then after Iblis disobeyed, he “kana” among the jinn. Many people translate the word “kana” in this instance to mean “was”, as if to say that the Quran says Iblis “was” among the jinn.

[18:50] And when We said to the angels, “Prostrate to Adam,” they then prostrated, except Iblis. He “kana” among the jinn, thus he has deviated from the command of his Lord…

The word ‘kana’ is an Arabic word which may indeed mean “was” but can sometimes mean “became” in instances such as verse 7:175.

In fact, even in verse 2:34 where it says Iblis “kana” among the disbelievers, the word “kana” in this verse means “became”. Iblis used to be a believer, but became among the disbelievers after his disobedience.

[2:34] And when We said to the angels, “Prostrate to Adam,” they then prostrated, except Iblis. He refused and was arrogant, and he “kana” (became) among the disbelievers.

What Exactly Are the Jinn?

Therefore, the story of Iblis teaches us that angels can disobey God, and those who do become reborn as jinn who are condemned to the physical World until Judgment Day where their fates are decided individually. Because this is exactly what the Quran says happened to Iblis; he was an angel, disobeyed God, then became reborn as a jinn as a second chance.

The jinn are thus former angels, reborn as a different being, who reside in our universe after being given a second chance, which some of them may utilize and others may not.

Verse 66:6 mentions a group of angels (the 19 keepers/guardians of Hell) who do not disobey God, but do what they are commanded.

Once again, this isn’t saying that they are incapable of disobeying God with their will, but they only, to this date, have not done so, and likely are never going to disobey God. As the keepers of Hell, they have full knowledge of what may await them if they did such a thing.

We learn a lot of things about the jinn in the fist 15 verses of Surah 72. We learn that the jinn are an intelligent, invisible species. We learn that the jinn have males and females, and they have believers and disbelievers. Just like today’s Christians, Surah 72 teaches that many of jinn too believe in ideas such as God had a son.

We learn from Surah 72 that the jinns are able to travel far and wide throughout the universe, and they are in some degree able to eavesdrop in issues related to God’s metaphysical realm because they themselves are metaphysical creatures, but they get pursued by flames if they try to do so (thus condemned only to our universe.

This makes our worldly life as essentially a place where beings like jinn who are penalized go to, until the Day of Judgment when they will receive their judgment.

In verse 6:130, we are informed that just like humans, jinn have their own messengers sent to them personally to inform them about God’s signs and warn them about Judgment Day (6:130). Or the other view of this verse is that jinns are supposed to respond to whatever portion of the revelations from human messengers they can apply to them.

[6:130] O assembly of the jinn and the human being, did not messengers from among you come to you, relating upon you My signs, and warning you of the meeting of this Day of yours? They said, “We have borne witness against ourselves.” And the life of the World deceived them, and they bore witness against themselves that they were disbelievers.

Humanity’s Previous Existence

The story of the jinns is related to us human beings, because we humans are here for similar reasons.

We committed sin during a previous existence, then we were given the chance to redeem ourselves in our current life, and our final fate is determined on Judgment Day.

The information of the jinn helps us further understand that the seven heavens are penal colony of sorts.

All things that exist in this universe (living and non-living) are here because they had a past life at God’s kingdom in Heaven, but during that past life they committed some type of transgression, thus were given a second chance and sent here.

This includes us humans.

The following verses give further proof that humans had a previous existence before they were all sent to Earth:

[33:72] Indeed, We have displayed the Trust upon the heavens, the earth, and the mountains, but they refused to carry it and were afraid of it, while the human being carried it. Indeed, he was wrongful, ignorant.

[7:172] And when your Lord took from the Children of Adam their offspring, from their backs, and had them bear witness upon themselves, “Was I not your Lord?” They said, “Yes. We have borne witness.” Lest you say on the Day of Establishment, “Indeed, we were unaware of this.”

[5:7] And remember God’s goodwill upon you, and His covenant with which He has pledged you when you said, “We heard, and we obeyed.” And revere God. Indeed, God is Knowledgeable of the possession of the chests.

[36:60] Did I not take a pledge from you, O Children of Adam, that you shall not worship the devil? Indeed, he is definitely a clear enemy to you.

To begin with, there is mention of the humans accepting a “trust” from God in verse 33:72-73. Of course, we don’t remember such an event because this occurred during our past life.

In verse 7:172 and 36:60, we took a pledge from God to worship Him, recognize Him as the Lord, and avoid the devil. This happened in our previous life because we don’t remember such a pledge today.

In verse 5:7. this verse is talking to the people at large, saying that we all took a covenant from God. We don’t remember this covenant because it occurred in the previous life.

Only Humanity Accepted The Trust

In verse 33:72, we took upon ourselves the Trust, and in this verse God called us ignorant and wrongful.

We aren’t ignorant and wrongful for accepting this Trust, but we humans were ignorant and wrongful for whatever thing we did that lead us to the point of God offering us this way out as an alternative to punishment.

All physical matter in existence in the seven heavens (including the mountains and trees, and the matter that makes up our own bodies) refused to take up the Trust, while the beings who accepted the Trust were destined to, in the second and current life, descend from Adam as humans.

The ones who were too scared to take on this risky Trust instead were far wiser and took the safer option. They agreed to spend their entire second lives as physical matter until Judgment Day, a state of being that is without a will or moral capability of their own, in constant submission to God by always obeying His laws of physics.

Whereas we humans were people who wanted to do the opposite, and take the Trust, which is defined throughout the Quran as the responsibility of willingly submitting to God after His guidance comes down to the people (verses 2:36, 7:24, 20:123, etc.)

We know this because the fact that they (all physical matter in existence in this universe, and all creatures apart from humans) were offered this Trust just like us indicates that they too are guilty of something in the past life like we are.

So all were offered two paths as a second chance: either become the stars, planets, galaxies, plants, animals, and trees, in constant submission to God’s will via the laws of physics and natural instincts, or take the Trust and be held accountable to a moral code from God.

It turns out that we humans chose the second option, which is accept the Trust.

The opinion of Rashad Khalifa is that we chose this second option in our previous lives, unlike the vast majority that chose the first option, because of our ego. We were far too confident in our own selves. Either that, or we felt too prideful to be born as what we thought were “lesser beings” such as animals, plants, bacteria, or the physical matter that makes up the seven universes that the Quran often mentions.

The way I like to think of it conceptually is that we chose to “play the video game in hard mode” despite being the “newbies” because we thought too highly of our own game-playing skills.

Living and Non-living Things

The Quran states that all physical matter and living things apart from humans are constantly prostrating to God, and in a state of Salat and sublimation (which is the recognition of God as pure, perfect, and sublime), but we don’t understand exactly how they do it.

This includes our own human bodies, which are in this state of submission alongside everything else.

We have made many advances in understanding the laws of physics that all matter follows.

Thus, from an Islamic perspective, studying science has a lot of spiritual meaning because it is essentially the study of the many ways that physical matter is in a state of constant worship, submission, and obedience to God, by following His laws of physics ceaselessly.

[50:6] And the stars and trees prostrate.

[17:44] The seven heavens and the earth, as well as whoever are in them, sublime God; there is not anything except which sublimes Him with His praise, but instead, you do not understand their sublimation. Indeed, He has been Forbearing, Forgiving.

[24:41] Do you not see that whoever in the heavens and the earth sublimes God, as well as the birds which line up? Each certainly knows its Salat and its sublimation, and God is Knowledgeable of what they do

[22:18] Do you not see that to God prostrates whoever is in the heavens, as well as whoever is in the earth, including the sun, the moon, the stars, the mountains, the trees, the creatures, and many of the people? But the word has been due upon many; whomever God humiliates, then there will not be any giver of honor for him. Indeed, God does what He wills.

The spiritual importance of science as the study of how the physical matter and living things in the universe worships God is probably one of the reasons why God in the Quran tells the people to study science. The Quran says to travel in the earth and find out how God began the creation of everything. The command to find out how God began His creation requires studying all the fields of science that we have today, such as biology, chemistry, physics, geology, astronomy, and more.

[29:20] Say, “Travel in the earth and observe how He began the creation. Then God will produce the creation of the Hereafter. Indeed, God is Capable on everything.”

Just as non-living things worship God by following His laws of physics, the Quran states living things worship God ceaselessly by following their God-given natural instincts.

The souls inhabiting living things are given much more freedom than the souls inhabiting non-living things, because after satisfying the natural instincts given by God and dictated in their genetics (hunger, thirst, sleep, reproduction, etc.), they are given freedom to do whatever they please.

It’s in a way similar to us humans being free to do what we want on Earth after satisfying the moral codes that God has dictated.

The Quran uses the honeybee as an example of that, showing God dictating to the honeybee its natural instincts:

[16:68-69] And your Lord revealed to the honeybee: “Take houses from the mountains and the trees, and what they (people) construct. Then eat from all the fruits, and follow the ways of your Lord tamely…”

And needless to say, the souls inhabiting physical matter or animals and plants are no less than the souls inhabiting human bodies; in many ways they are better than us because they lacked our ego and chose to “play the game” in easy mode.

If your soul was transported to the body of a cat, you will have only the reasoning capabilities of a cat. The same applies to dogs, plants, bacteria, and fish. If your soul inhabited physical matter, you would not be conscious or able to do anything willingly.

What Is Humanity’s “Original Sin”?

So, what exactly was the great crime that we committed in our previous existence?

It is not explicitly stated, but Rashad Khalifa believes that long ago, while Iblis was still an angel, he started spreading around this blasphemous idea that there can be multiple gods, and that he too is capable of being a god besides God.

According to Rashad, this caused a significant amount of the population in Heaven to have split opinions.

Some of them continued to uphold God’s authority unquestioningly, and those remained as angels, with continued access to God’s kingdom.

Some of them initially sided with Iblis, but then later realized their mistake and repented, and were offered two ways to compensate: either do it the easy way and be reborn in this life without free will and in complete submission to God as physical matter within God’s seven heavens, or do it the hard way and accept the Trust, and be sent down here as humans whose job it is to find and submit to God with our own free will.

And lastly, there was another group who were like Iblis, because they never repented to God and remained as rebellious; God was going to send them to Hell, but they asked for a delay and God granted it, so they were put to death and reborn as jinns.

The Quran implies this to be the case, because immediately before being sent down to Earth, God took a pledge from all the future descendants of Adam to not worship the devil, and to recognize God alone as Lord (verses 36:60, 7:172).

If the expiation or repayment for our great crime is to willingly recognize God’s authority and avoid worshipping the devil after being reborn on Earth as a human, then it is very likely that the original crime itself that occurred in our past life was a failure to uphold the authority of God alone and believing that Iblis can be a god as well.

Every Human Has a Jinn Companion

Unlike the human beings, the jinn did not accept any sort of trust or take a pledge with God that they will worship Him alone. They remained unrepentant to the very end. However, due to God’s mercy, a pathway for redemption has been opened up for the jinn.

The plan for the redemption of humans and jinns is that they would inhabit this world as companions of one another. The jinns (or whatever they call themselves in their native languages) would inspire humans to do either good or evil, and the humans will do the same to their jinn companions.

If any jinn manages to be guided, then he or she will have earned God’s redemption.

The Quran mentions that every person has a jinn companion with them from birth to death, who will be the primary witness for or against a person on Judgement Day. Our jinn companions instinctively have a tendency to promote doing bad things, and inspiring bad thoughts to people, but they have potential to be guided.

[41:25] And We designated for them companions who adorned for them what was before them and what was behind them, and the word among communities of the jinn and the human being that certainly have passed on before them was due upon them. Indeed, they were losers.

[43:36-38] And whoever should turn from the reminder of the Almighty, We designate for him a devil, who thus is a companion for him. And indeed, they (the jinn companions) definitely hinder them (the disbelieving humans) from the way, while they reckon they are guided. Until when he came to Us, he said, “Oh, I wish the distance of the two easts was between me and you!” Thus, wretched has been the companion.

[50:21-27] And every self has come with a driver and a witness (the jinn companion). Certainly, you definitely were unaware of this. We thus removed your obscurant from you, so your sight today is sharp. And his companion said, “This is what is ready with me.”…His companion said, “Our Lord, I did not make him transgress, but instead, he was in far straying.” He (God) said, “Do not contend with Me, while certainly, I sent forth to you the promise.”

According to Surah 72 and others, jinn can travel far and wide throughout the universe easily, only being stopped from going too far outside the universe by special flames that can affect only them. Those jinns aren’t attached to any human companions, so this indicates that when their assigned human companions die, the jinns become unbound and live on for a period of time.

Rashad Khalifa believes that the jinn companions inhabit the human body alongside the human soul since birth, and become almost like a second version of oneself during the duration of the companionship. Like for example, a human named John Doe has a jinn companion in them who also identifies as John Doe, and knows everything that the human John Doe knows.

Rashad believes that while the jinns have a strong natural bias towards Iblis’s point of view, both you and your jinn companion mutually influence each other’s personalities.

Adam and Eve

The Quran indicates that the story of Adam and Eve began after the human beings accepted the Trust, and all souls were put to the first death and reborn in this world, placed into their assigned roles (whether physical matter or living things). Adam and Eve were the first two souls among those who were given the Trust to be placed inside a human body.

That is because in verse 2:30, before Adam was even created, God announced His intent to put Adam on planet Earth as a ruler.

[2:30] And when your Lord said to the angels, “Indeed, I will place a ruler in the earth.” They said, “Will you place therein he who will spread corruption therein and shed blood, while we sublime You with Your praise and sanctify You?” He said, “Indeed, I know what you do not know.”

The fact that an “earth” existed indicated that Adam’s creation took place long after humanity accepted the Trust, and the other souls rejected the Trust and chose the safer option (to be reborn as physical matter or creatures in this world).

Also, a human would not have been created with the intention of placing him on planet Earth if the “Trust” between God and the humans didn’t occur yet, given that the “Trust” is the whole reason that humanity will be going down to Earth in the first place.

So, everyone already knows the story from the Quran. Iblis refused to prostrate, then became a jinn, then Adam and his wife was allowed to stay in Paradise until they ate from the forbidden tree and was evicted from Paradise.

Now the question is, if everyone was put to the first death already (including the souls of those who were destined to be born as humans and jinn on Earth) then why was Iblis still allowed to remain alive and as an angel? Was he not the one who instigated the original sin in the first place?

It could be that by making the angels prostrate to a human being, this was part of a plan to expose or establish Iblis as the chief culprit. This plan worked, because Iblis could not bring himself to prostrate to a being whom he assumed was less than him, while the other angels were devout and sincere servants of God.

It was then that God decided to make Iblis a jinn, and make him inhabit the first jinn body, just as Adam inhabited the first human body out of those in the population who accepted the Trust. Both humans and jinns began their descent to Earth at the same time, starting with Adam, Eve, and Iblis.

The second question is, why not send Adam and Eve down to Earth right away? Why wait for them to mess up in Paradise first?

This was done perhaps to exemplify to the future generations of humans how the devil is humanity’s worst enemy, and to be a warning that the devil is not operating in the best interests of mankind. Just as Adam and his wife were tempted with lies and deception, the devil will always try to tempt humanity into doing wrong things by lying to them and deceiving them.

Conclusion

In conclusion, everything in existence in this life (humans, animals, plants, physical matter, etc.) had a previous existence, and were all sent down here for redemption according to the Quran.

Only we humans made a deal with God that aside from just following natural instincts like everything else, we will come to worship God willingly after receiving guidance and moral laws. We took the riskier deal compared to all other creatures.

This adds a layer of depth to the question of why we are here. God didn’t simply create the humans to live on Earth just because He felt like it. This is something we asked for, and we got what we wanted.

Now the question is, will we uphold our end of the deal or not?

For the sequel, or Part 3, of this article, click here:

Adam and Eve Were Not the First Humans