26 Preface أَحياءً وَأَمواتًاYusuf AliThe living and the dead,1What a wonderful parable! The earth is a place where death and life, decay and growth and decay, green grass, stubble, and fuel, corruption and purification jostle together?one often leading to the other. The drama which we see with our own eyes in this world should enable us to appreciate the wonders in the spiritual world where the despised and rejected receive the highest honour. Lazarus rests in Abraham’s bosom, and the Pharaoh is led in chains for his arrogance and his sin.