more substantial form grows, the weaker reality becomes. The less substantial form becomes, to that degree the reality grows stronger.

This law encompasses all things included in the law of evolution or being perfected. It means that a time is certain to come when the Manifest World, which is the shell and form of the mighty reality of the universe, will break up with the permission of the All-Glorious Creator. Then it will be renewed in a better form. The meaning of the verse:

That day the Earth will be changed into a different Earth (14:48)

will be realized.

In Short: The death of the world is possible. Moreover, there can be no doubt that it is possible.

#### Second Matter

SECOND MATTER: This is the actual death of the world. The proof of this matter is the consensus of all the revealed religions; the testimony of all sound natures; the indication of all the changes, transformations, and alterations in the universe; the testimony to the number of centuries and years through their deaths in this guesthouse of the world, of all living worlds and mobile worlds to the death of the world itself.

If you want to imagine the death agonies of the world as the Qur’an shows them to be, think of how the parts of the universe are bound to one another with an exact, exalted order. They are held with such a hidden, delicate, subtle bond and are so bound within an order that on a single one of the lofty heavenly bodies receiving the command: “Be!” or, “Quit your orbit!”, the world will go into its death agonies. The stars will collide, the heavenly bodies reel, a great din will strike up in infinite space like the devastating sound of millions of cannonballs and great guns the size of globes. Clashing and colliding with one another, sending out showers of sparks, the mountains taking flight, the seas burning, the face of the earth will be flattened.

With this death and those agonies the Pre-Eternal One of Power will shake up the universe. He will purify the universe, and Hell and the matters of Hell will draw to one side, and Paradise and the matters appropriate for Paradise draw to the other, and the world of the hereafter will become manifest.

#### Third Matter

THIRD MATTER: The return to life of the world, which will die, is possible. For, as is proved in the Second Fundamental Point, there is no deficiency in divine power, and the things necessitating it are extremely powerful. The matter is within the realm of the possible. And if a possible matter has something extremely powerful to necessitate it and there is no deficiency in the power of the agent, it may be regarded not as possible, but as actual.