10.5. The Hereafter:

We can not talk too much about the Hereafter, because it has been mentioned that it is different from what we may imagine [Kanz: 39236, 39241], but as we've mentioned above that the holders of the Throne/Kingdom are now four and in the Hereafter they shall be eight. So it is possible that the Hereafter will be four dimensional (4-D) because doubling the number of forces requires new dimensions for the new forces to operate.

Moreover, we notice that our major senses relate to dimensions in the following manner. Hearing requires only 1-D, because the propagation of sound waves is received by the ear one bit at a time. Seeing, on the other hand, requires 2-D because at any instance we may perceive a picture that occupies a surface. To conceive 3-D, however, we need imagination because the 3-D space that we conceive is built up as a result of the integration of 2-D pictures that we perceive through the flow of time. We only perceive 1-D, by hearing, and 2-D, by seeing, and we conceive 3-D, by imagination. So our thoughts, or imaginations, that we have in our memory are indeed mostly 2-D pictures (but also 1-D sounds) but by integrating them over time we conceive the volume. Thus, it is possible, and plausible, that in the Hereafter we shall gain new faculty, more advanced than imagination, that allow us to conceive of 4-D. In this case our thoughts shall be 3-D as confirmed by Ibn Arabi and many hadith that describe the Paradise. For example Ibn Arabi confirms that people in Paradise shall have the power of creating through the command 'be', just as Allah does in this world [al-Masa il: 126, I.84.21, II.157.26, II.440.35, II.441.26, III.295.17], and he also affirms that this is also attainable (by some people) in this world [al-Masa il: 126, III.295.14]. This is also called: al-fi l bil-himma (doing by intention or determination) [I.259.33].

On the other hand, and since we have seen that the Real is 0-D and that the angels are the first repeated manifestation of the Real, and so on the jinn are manifestations of the second order (in 2-D). Thus humans are more advanced and complex that jinn because they are created by the manifestations of the Real in the third order. Likewise, it is expected that the Hereafter shall be the fourth order manifestation.

The Creation is done through the Pen who is writing the words of the All-Merciful. This Pen started by writing the dot (absolute Spirits, including the real; 0-D) and then the angels by making a line (1-D), and he continued until a certain term where he started another line, thus making a plane (2-D) and that is the creation of jinn. After that and at the certain term also, he started making new planes, thus forming the volume (3-D) as we are in now. And eventually the Pen will start, at a certain term (ajal), a new dimension to open the life in the Hereafter (4-D). This 'term' is either the time of our death (al-ajal) or possibly the time of spiritual realization (al-fateh) which is also a kind of voluntary death [IV.354.19] (Morris 2002: 105-7). We have already seen in section II.11 that Ibn Arabi specified the starting times between those different terms (see Figure II.1).

It is also possible in Paradise that the Creation will continue, endlessly, into higher dimensions (n-D, where n is any integer number), more than 4. Maybe that is what it means when Ibn Arabi says: 'seeking (al-suluk; into Allah) is always requested in this life and also in the Hereafter. For if there was a destiny, it would have been possible to achieve (but there is no destiny)' [al-Masa il: 203]. It is probably here where abstract mathematics which can deal with any number of dimensions and different types of topological spaces has anticipated this hypothetical structure of the world, whereas physicists up till now can not conceive of more than three dimensions.

Finally, we must add that conceiving the world in this way according to the dimensions will greatly help in any possible future computer simulations to test the Single Monad Model, because in this way we should be able to see whether the current structure of stars and galaxies could have happened starting from the initial conditions and rules that we described above and in Chapter IV when we discussed the actual flow of time.