Life after Life

What is death? Where does the soul go when it leaves the body? What happens in the grave? Will we return to life? And what will judgement, intercession, Paradise and Hell actually mean?

These are questions that have occupied philosophers, theologians and ordinary human beings for centuries. Life After Life approaches them from within the Islamic intellectual tradition, taking readers on a structured journey from this world to the world beyond.

The book unfolds across three stages-The Interim House, The Waiting House, and The Eternal House-examining death itself, the intermediate realm of Barzakh, and, finally, resurrection and eternal life. Along the way, Mohammad Javad Norouzi and Dr Amir Rastin address more than thirty questions, including the fear and agonies of death, who takes the soul, reincarnation, the connection between souls, deeds that continue after death, visiting graves and seeking blessings at sacred sites, rajʿah, bodily resurrection, the Scale (Mīzān), reckoning, intercession, the embodiment of deeds, Hell and the resurrection of animals.

Recognising that the unseen cannot simply be subjected to empirical observation, the authors draw principally upon rational argument, the Holy Qur'an and the teachings of the Infallibles (a) to illuminate what Islamic revelation tells us about the journey ahead.

Accessible yet substantial, Life After Life transforms the discussion of death from something to be feared or avoided into an invitation to understand the purpose of our present life and to prepare consciously for what follows.