If I were ignorant of this truth, I would react with anger and frustration. I would question his behavior with fury and try to correct him. Knowledge enables me to remain calm, to not react with emotions. Knowledge saves me from the unnecessary burdens of impulsive reactions and the tiresome repercussions arising as a result.
When a person gets infuriated and angry, millions of cells are terminated instantly! One moment of anger, depending on its intensity, can cause millions of short circuits and explosions at the molecular level, sometimes even damaging irreplaceable brain cells! So, how can a learned person who has acquired knowledge display such behavior and cause his own demise? Could this be true knowledge? If knowledge does not prevent us from harming ourselves and others, if knowledge does not ‘shape’ us, then we cannot really claim to have knowledge.
The cut of a diamond is what determines its value. A one-carat diamond with 52 facets is much more valuable than the same diamond with 32 or 16 facets. The more a diamond is cut, the more its value will increase.
We, also, are like diamonds. The more knowledge cuts and shapes us, the more we increase in value.
Question: If the level of knowledge that I can acquire is up to me, that is, if I’m in charge of using my brain to evaluate knowledge, then it’s logical to assume the ‘step’ we form in the staircase is not fixed, which means the staircase itself is not stable?
Our place in the staircase is fixed. The place we occupy, the ‘step’ we compose, is the very purpose of our creation. However, its final shape is determined at the point of death. So long as we are living, we are still being cut and shaped.
As for the ‘shaping’ that happens in hell, it is like a final cleansing of the residues of impurities we carry from our worldly life. Like purifying gold with fire, it doesn’t add any further value to it; only purifies it.
As such, hell is not a place of getting shaped, but rather, it is a place of purification.
Hellfire purifies and solidifies the things we’ve gained in the world, so we may enter heaven as refined beings.
No matter what the apparent reason may be, everyone experiences an intermediate phase in their lives, during which they suffer an internal burning. This burning, referred to as ‘hellfire’, is a way of cleansing ourselves from inappropriate states that impede our heavenly existence.
Those who are destined to stay in hell forever will also eventually reach a state of refinement after intense and extended suffering.
But, at the end of all suffering, the fire will be extinguished, the burning will end, and new life will spring from the ashes.