What Are the Major Signs of the Final Hour?
Answered by Shaykh Dr. Mohammad Fayez Awad
Question
What are the major signs of the Final Hour?
Answer
All praise belongs to Allah (Most High). Peace and salutations be upon Our Master Muhammad, the Messenger of Allah, his family, companions, and those who followed him.
Belief in the Last Day (Akhira) is one of the six pillars of faith; Allah (Most High) has hidden when the Hour will be from creation as tremendous wisdom and far-reaching secrets; however, He has alluded to some of the Signs of the Final Hour approaching in the Quran and Sunna so that people thoroughly prepare themselves for Judgment Day.
Allah (Most High) says, “Are they only waiting for the Hour to take them by surprise? Yet some of its signs have already come. Once it befalls them, will it not be too late to be mindful?” [Quran, 47:18]
Are the disbelievers waiting for the Final Hour to come unexpectedly without prior knowledge? Signs regarding it have come, and from among them is the coming of the Prophet (Allah bless him and give him peace), and the splitting of the moon. How will they remember when the Final Hour arrives?
These signs are of three types: minor (sughra), middle (wusta), and major (kubra). They are known as the Signs of The Hour.
Some of the major signs are:
1. Dajjal
The Prophet (Allah bless him and give him peace) described for us the attributes of Dajjal, his fitna, from where he will emerge, the duration of his stay on earth, and where he will be killed. The Prophet (Allah bless him and give him peace) said, “There wasn’t any prophet except that he warned his nation (umma) about the one-eyed liar, he truly is one-eyed, and your Lord is not one-eyed, and that ‘kafir’ is written between his eyes.” [Bukhari; Muslim]
2. The Descent of ‘Isa (Jesus) (peace be upon him)
There are Hadith that have come regarding this. There is mention of this in the narration of Nawas Ibn Sam‘an (Allah be pleased with him): “Allah will send ‘Isa (Jesus), son of Maryam (Mary), who will descend at the white minaret on the eastern side of Damascus, wearing two garments lightly dyed and placing his hands on the wings of two angels. When he lowers his head, drops of water will fall from his head, and when he raises it, drops like pearls will scatter from it.
Every disbeliever who will come across his (i.e., ‘Isa’s) scent will die, and his scent will reach as far as he will be able to see. He will then search for Dajjal until he catches hold of him at the gate of Ludd (a village near Jerusalem) and kills him. Then the people, whom Allah (Most High) will have protected, will come to ‘Isa son of Maryam, and he will wipe their faces and inform them of their ranks in Janna. [Muslim]
3. The Emergence of Ya’juj and Ma’juj (Gog and Magog)
At the time of Isa’s coming, Ya’juj and Ma’juj will emerge. Then Allah (Most High) will send Ya’juj and Ma’juj, and they will swarm down from every slope. The first of them would pass the lake of Tiberias and drink out of it. When the last of them pass, then they will say: “There was once water there.” [Muslim]
4. Smoke
Allah (Most High) has said, “[O Prophet], watch out for the day when the sky brings forth clouds of smoke for all to see. It will envelop the people. They will cry, ‘This is a terrible torment.’” [Quran, 44:10-11]
It has come in a Hadith from Abu Malik Ash‘ari (Allah be pleased with him) that he said that the Messenger of Allah (Allah bless him and give him peace) said that your Lord had warned you regarding three matters: The smoke that will affect the believer like a cold, and will overcome the disbeliever. He will then inflate until the smoke leaves his ears. The second is the beast, and the third is the Dajjal. [Abu Dawud; Tabarani, Al-Mu‘jam al-Kabir]
5. The Sun Rising from the West
‘Abdullah Ibn ‘Amr reported: “I committed to memory a hadith from the Messenger of Allah (Allah bless him and give him peace). I did not forget it after I had heard Allah’s Messenger say, ‘The first sign (out of the signs of the appearance of the Dajjal) would be the appearance of the sun from the west, the appearance of the Beast before the people in the forenoon. Whichever of the two happens first, the second one would follow immediately after that.’” [Muslim]
6. The Emergence of the Beast (Dabba)
“And when the decree of the Hour comes to pass against them, We will bring forth for them a beast from the earth, telling them that the people had no sure faith in Our revelations.” [Quran, 27:82]
The time of its emergence is very near when the Sun rises from the west.
The soundest narration regarding the state of people during the Final Hour is what Imam Ahmad narrates in his Musnad from Abu ’Umama (Allah be pleased with him). He ascribes it to the Messenger of Allah (Allah bless him and give him peace) that the Beast will emerge and leave a mark on their noses, and those people will continue to live amongst you. Then a man shall buy a camel and ask the seller, “Who did you buy it from?” He will say, “I bought it from one of the marked men.” [Ahmad]
7- Three Landslides
Hudhayfa Ibn ’Usayd reported: “The Messenger of Allah (Allah bless him and give him peace) was in a room, and we were beneath it; he came in and asked us: ‘What are you discussing?’ We said: ‘We are talking about the Final Hour.’ Thereupon he said, ‘The Final Hour will not come until ten signs appear: land-sliding in the east, land-sliding in the west, land-sliding in the Arabian Peninsula, the smoke, the Dajjal, the Beast of the Earth, Ya’juj and Ma’juj, the rising of the Sun from the West and the fire which would emit from the lower part of ‘Adan(Yemen) driving people away.’” [Muslim]
8 The Fire that Will Gather People
This is the last of the signs.
It was narrated that Abu Hurayra (Allah be pleased with him) said: “The Messenger of Allah (Allah bless him and give him peace) said, ‘The people will be gathered on the Day of Resurrection in three ways, (the first will be) those who have hope (of Paradise) and fear (of punishment); (the second will be) those who come riding two on a camel, three on a camel, four on a camel, ten on a camel; and the rest of them will be gathered by the fire which will accompany them, stopping with them where they rest in the afternoon, and staying with them where they stop overnight, and staying with them wherever they are in the morning, and in the evening.’” [Bukhari; Muslim]
The wisdom in the signs appearing before the Final Hour is to awaken the heedless and urge them to repent and prepare themselves. Allah (Most High) has kept the date of the Final Hour hidden. Imam Alusi (Allah have mercy on him) said that this leads to obedience and deters one from sins.
People must fear what is to come and the closeness of the meeting with the Almighty, Possessor of the heavens and the earth. So, a person should not delude himself with the adornments of this fleeting world – it is only full of false aspirations. It is necessary to wake up. A person is either going to end up in paradise or the fire.
There are many books on the tribulations and signs of the Final Hour, matters of the next world, and the states of the intermediary realm (Barzakh). The most important books are Al-Tadhkira by Imam Qurtubi, Al-Nihaya by Imam Ibn Kathir, and Al-Isha‘a by Imam Barzanji.
[Shaykh] Dr. Muhammad Fayez Awad
Checked and Approved by Shaykh Mohammad Badhib
Shaykh Dr. Muhammad Fayez Awad, born in Damascus, Syria, in 1965, pursued his Islamic studies in the mosques and institutes of Damascus. A graduate of the Islamic University of Medina in 1985, he holds a Ph.D. in Islamic Studies from Bahauddin Zakariya University in Pakistan.
He has extensive experience developing curricula and enhancing the teaching of various academic courses, including conducting intensive courses. Shaykh Awad has taught Fiqh, Usul al-Fiqh, Quranic sciences, the history of legislation, inheritance laws, and more at several institutes and universities such as Al-Furqan Institute for Islamic Sciences and Majma‘ al-Fath al-Islami in Damascus.
He is a lecturer at the Sultan Muhammad al-Fatih Waqf University in Istanbul, teaching various Arabic and Islamic subjects, and teaches at numerous Islamic institutes in Istanbul. Shaykh Awad is a member of the Association of Syrian Scholars, a founding member of the Zayd bin Thabit Foundation, a member of the Syrian Scholars Association, and a member of the Academic Council at the Iman Center for Teaching the Sunna and Quran.
Among his teachers from whom he received Ijazat are his father, Shaykh Muhammad Muhiyiddin Awad, Shaykh Muhiyiddin al-Kurdi, Shaykh Muhammad Karim Rajih, Shaykh Usama al-Rifai, Shaykh Ayman Suwaid, Shaykh Ahmad al-Qalash, Shaykh Muhammad Awwama, and Shaykh Mamduh Junayd.
