Trumpet Blowing on the Day of Judgment

In the Name of Allah, Most Merciful and Compassionate

Scholars have differed whether the trumpet will be blow twice or thrice. Most scholars (including Imam Qurtubi, Imam Sawi, Imam Ghazali, and others) hold the opinion that the trumpet will be blown twice: at the first blow, people will die; at the second blow, they will be raised back to life. This is based on the verse, "And the trumpet is blown, and all who are in the heavens and all who are in the earth fall dead, save him whom Allah willeth. Then it is blown a second time, and behold them standing waiting! " (39:68).

Other scholars hold the opinion that the trumpet will be blown three times. Among the proofs they cite for their position is the verse, " And (remind them of) the Day when the Trumpet will be blown, and all who are in the heavens and the earth will start in fear, save him whom Allah willeth. And all come unto Him, humbled." (27:87), deducing from this verse that before the two blows mentioned above, there is another blow that will strike fear in everyone's hearts. Those who hold the position that there will be only two blows join between the two verses by saying that the first blow shall strike fear into people's hearts and then cause them to die.

Each side has additional proofs for their position. Imam Fakhr al-Din al-Razi cites both opinions in his monumental exegesis of the Qur'an and does not strengthen either interpretation over the other.

Since the primary sources do not spell out unequivocally whether the trumpet will be blown twice or thrice, this issue is not a central point of our faith and we are not obliged to believe in the correctness of one position over the other. Instead of focussing on the fine point of the number of times that the trumpet will be blown, we should focus our attention on how we are preparing for the judgment that will follow the various blows.

Imam Ghazali writes in the final book of the Ihya `Ulum al-Din,

"More fearsome that all of this, however, are the perils which shall confront him subsequently: the Trumpet-Blast, the Resurrection on the Day of Arising, the Presentation before the Almighty, the Inquisition regarding matters both important and minor, the Erection of Scales in order that men's destinies might be known, and then the passage over the Traverse despite the fineness and sharpness of its edge. These things shall be followed by the awaiting of the Summons to final judgment, and either bliss or misery.

You are obliged to know of these circumstances and terrible events, and to believe in them with a firm and convinced faith; you must ponder them at length so that there might issue from your heart a motivation to make ready for them. For faith in the Last Day has not entered or become established the hearts of the greater part of mankind, as is demonstrated by the great preparations they make for summer's heat and the cold of winter, and their making light of the heat of the Inferno and its bitter cold, and the woes and terrors which it contains." (The Remembrance of Death and the Afterlife, Tr. T.J. Winter).

And Allah Most High knows best.

Hamza.