After being cast down to earth, Adam and Eve atoned for their monumental mistake. When comparing the exceedingly harsh travails of earthly life with the incomparably pleasures of eternal Paradise, remorse gripped their hearts and they incessantly begged for forgiveness. In His infinite wisdom, the Almighty forgave them because with sincere repentance redemption is always at hand.
Prophets taught that the surest way to avoid committing sin was to avoid treading the path that leads to it. To do that, all doors of temptation must be locked tight. Anyone who dares open them must prepare himself for the consequences, and those are usually dire. Islam is all about prevention rather than cure.
Keeping that door locked shut prevents the evil of sin from ever coming through and taking over our lives. Prophet Muhammad said, "When man commits a sin, a dark spot is inscribed in his heart. Once his sins multiply and he does not repent from them, the dark spots blemish his heart until it becomes one single dark clot."
Once we cross a moral barrier and do not quickly repent from it we may never be the same person again. By crossing the line into the world of depravity, the moral compass that regulates man’s ethical behavior is thrown into flailing disorientation. Atoning for that sinful behavior is essential to being a wholesome human being because immorality is detrimental to man’s spiritual and social health. Whether it is a mistake we made at work, a lie we told our spouse, an impropriety or indiscretion we committed, redeeming ourselves by first apologizing and then promising never to repeat the offense is paramount to restoring personal integrity and earning forgiveness from the people we offended. How can we not apply this standard with our Creator?
Divine laws are primarily meant to curtail the spread of evil, which, if allowed to proliferate, will extend like a cancer and destroy a healthy society. The evils of pornography for example are perfidiously deleterious. The multi-billion dollar business is more dangerous to the moral fiber of society than illicit drugs are to the physical body. Pornography degrades women, promotes loose behavior and encourages fornication and adultery. Fornication and adultery destroy marriages, devastate families, render children parentless, and are responsible for the spread of sexual diseases and other social ills. A sin usually starts with a frivolous act, then amounts to a hill of beans and then becomes a Mount Everest of irrevocable evil.
Another example is the consumption of alcohol. Muslims are forbidden even from socializing at bars or sitting at tables where alcohol is being either sold or consumed because that in itself is an unsuspecting door to temptation. If one does not mind socializing with alcohol drinkers, taking a sip might not seem so wrong.
The evils of alcohol are too many to name. It suffices to say that alcoholism and alcohol-related vehicle accidents are responsible for the loss of hundreds of thousands of lives every year in this country alone.
Inserting a quarter in a slot machine might seem like an innocent act but in reality it opens a door to evil. Greed starts with a quarter then eventually becomes millions of dollars of gambling debt that inevitably leads either to crime or suicide. God, who made man, fully knows man’s weaknesses and that is why He sent down laws to be strictly obeyed and followed. The Qur’an for instance warns against "following in the footsteps of Satan," in other words, falling into the trap of temptation, which in turn will inevitably lead to sin that is clearly harmful and detrimental to both the individual and society at large.
Prophets were sent to teach that the evils of sin lead astray, down the path of punishment, and that the straight path is that of obeying God and living according to His laws and commandments. If man is unable to understand this basic credo, his fate is to wander in the wilderness of this life ruled by his own lawless desires and futile assertions that science will one day decipher the meaning of existence (but even if it did, science could never provide a moral code of conduct that is essential to man’s subsistence).
Many a philosopher, a scientist, an agnostic and a skeptic left the world with little explanation to why we are here on earth. To this day, life remains a mystery to all except to those who accept God’s existence and the power of manifest destiny.
Those who acknowledge that Adam’s sin was his own undoing, caused by his penchant for evil, will accept that the meaning of existence is much too simple to comprehend. Humanity is simply to atone for sin and prove its worthiness back into eternity. To do that, every soul must tailor its life to please God and take responsibility for its own sinful actions and ultimately use sincere repentance as a means to gain redemption. As to the way to redemption, man ought to use his reason and intellect to find the true path by following in the footsteps of Prophets; on his own man is simply incapable of finding salvation.
If there is anything to be learned from the story of creationism, it is that man is inclined and destined to sin, that with sin must come repentance and that divine guidance is the surest way back to Paradise Lost. Seeking redemption entails following the straight path of the Prophets. Once we accept this simple premise, our quest for salvation would make complete sense and the meaning of life becomes very clear.
