Short answer
Most religions expect a great ending, but they differ on what it is and who brings it. Islam teaches a Last Day known only to God (﷾), with ten great signs before it, among them the False Messiah and the return of Jesus. Some signs have already come, such as barefoot herdsmen competing in tall buildings, and the greatest have not. Jews await a king from David's line who will rebuild the Temple. Christians await the return of Jesus, and many evangelicals read the modern State of Israel as a sign. Hindus and Buddhists see ages that turn in cycles. Sikhs and Jains expect no Last Day. Most believers simply wait. But a small and growing group of Jews is preparing a Third Temple, breeding red heifers for its purifying ashes, and some evangelical Christians are helping them. That Temple would stand where the Dome of the Rock stands, so this touches a place holy to Muslims. Israel's Chief Rabbinate has long forbidden Jews even to enter the site. A prophecy you arrange yourself proves nothing. Islam teaches the opposite: leave the time to God (﷾), and prepare yourself.
Full explanation
Three questions for every faith
Three questions show where the faiths part. What is coming? Who brings it? And may people hurry it along? The third matters most today. A belief about the future is a private matter while people wait. It becomes everyone's business when they act on it, because the plans of a few can reach the holiest places of others.
| Faith | What is coming | Who brings it | Is anyone pushing it? |
|---|---|---|---|
| Islam | The Hour, then Judgement | God (﷾); Jesus returns before it | Forbidden; a few extremists tried |
| Judaism | The Messiah's age and a rebuilt Temple | A king from David's line | A small, growing group; the Chief Rabbinate objects |
| Christianity | The return of Jesus and Judgement | Jesus | Some evangelicals help; many churches object |
| Latter-day Saints | Jesus reigns; Zion in America | Jesus | No: they gather people into the Church |
| Hinduism | The Kali age ends, and the ages turn again | Kalki | No |
| Buddhism | Decline, renewal, a new Buddha | Metteyya | No |
| Sikhism | No end of the world | No one | No |
| Jainism | Endless cycles of time | No one | No |
Islam: the Hour, and only God (﷾) knows when
The Qur'an says the knowledge of the Hour is with God (﷾) alone. It asks the Prophet (ﷺ): "Wherein art thou (concerned) with the declaration thereof?" So no Muslim may name a date. The smaller signs have been coming for centuries, and a separate page sets them out. The Prophet (ﷺ) also named ten great signs: the smoke, the False Messiah, the beast, the sun rising from the west, the descent of Jesus, Gog and Magog, three landslides, and a fire from Yemen. Then the Trumpet sounds, the dead are raised and every person is judged. So the end in Islam is not mainly a story about nations. It leads to one moment, when each person answers for his own deeds.
“They ask thee about the (final) Hour - when will be its appointed time? Say: "The knowledge thereof is with my Lord (alone): None but He can reveal as to when it will occur. Heavy were its burden through the heavens and the earth. Only, all of a sudden will it come to you." They ask thee as if thou Wert eager in search thereof: Say: "The knowledge thereof is with Allah (alone), but most men know not."”
“They ask thee about the Hour,-'When will be its appointed time? Wherein art thou (concerned) with the declaration thereof? With thy Lord in the Limit fixed therefor.”
Hudhayfa ibn Asid reports that the Prophet (ﷺ) came upon his companions discussing the Hour. He said it will not come until they see ten signs: the smoke, the False Messiah (al-Dajjal), the beast, the sun rising from the west, the descent of Jesus son of Mary, Gog and Magog, and three landslides, in the east, in the west and in Arabia. Last comes a fire from Yemen that drives people to the place of their assembly.
“Then watch thou for the Day that the sky will bring forth a kind of smoke (or mist) plainly visible,”
“And when the Word is fulfilled against them (the unjust), we shall produce from the earth a beast to (face) them: He will speak to them, for that mankind did not believe with assurance in Our Signs.”
“Until the Gog and Magog (people) are let through (their barrier), and they swiftly swarm from every hill.”
“The Trumpet will (just) be sounded, when all that are in the heavens and on earth will swoon, except such as it will please Allah (to exempt). Then will a second one be sounded, when, behold, they will be standing and looking on!”
The ten great signs
- The smoke
- The False Messiah
- The beast
- The sun rising from the west
- The descent of Jesus, son of Mary
- Gog and Magog
- Three landslides: east, west and Arabia
- A fire from Yemen that drives people to their gathering
Signs already seen
The Prophet (ﷺ) said he and the Hour were sent like two fingers side by side. So his own coming was the first sign. He listed his death among six signs before the Hour, and the next on that list was the conquest of Jerusalem, which came in the 630s. He said about thirty liars would claim to be messengers, and Musaylima came in his own lifetime. He said barefoot herdsmen would compete in tall buildings, that people would boast about their mosques, and that some of his people would drink wine under another name. All of this can be checked today. So Muslims have no need to hunt through the news for signs. Those already seen are enough to show that he spoke the truth.
Anas reports that the Prophet (ﷺ) said he was sent, and the Hour, like these two, meaning two fingers side by side.
Awf ibn Malik reports that during the expedition to Tabuk the Prophet (ﷺ), sitting in a leather tent, told him to count six signs before the Hour: the Prophet's own death; the conquest of Jerusalem; a deadly plague among them like the plague that strikes sheep; wealth so plentiful that a man given a hundred dinars would still be dissatisfied; a trial that would enter every Arab house; and a truce with the Byzantines, who would then betray it and attack under eighty banners.
A history of Palestine under Muslim rule by an Israeli historian of the Cairo Geniza. Gil records that under Byzantine rule Jews were not allowed to live in Jerusalem, and that a Geniza fragment confirms it was Umar who gave the Jews permission to settle there, after bargaining with the patriarch in his presence, so that seventy families came from Tiberias.
Abu Hurayra reports that the Prophet (ﷺ) said the Hour will not come until two groups with the same claim fight each other with great losses, and until about thirty liars appear, every one of them claiming to be a messenger of Allah.
Ibn Abbas reports that Musaylima, known as the Liar, came to Medina in the Prophet's (ﷺ) lifetime with many of his tribe, saying he would follow the Prophet if he were given the rule after him. The Prophet refused him and said he thought Musaylima was the man shown to him in a dream. Through Abu Hurayra the report adds the Prophet's dream of two gold bracelets, which he took to mean that two liars claiming prophethood would appear after him; they proved to be al-Ansi and Musaylima.
Umar ibn al-Khattab reports that a stranger in very white clothes came and questioned the Prophet (ﷺ) about Islam, faith and excellence in worship, and then about the Hour. The Prophet said the one asked knew no more than the one asking, and gave two of its signs: a slave woman will give birth to her mistress, and you will see barefoot, poorly clothed, destitute shepherds competing with one another in raising tall buildings. Afterwards the Prophet told Umar the stranger was the angel Gabriel, who had come to teach them their religion.
The Council's database, the standard record of the world's tallest buildings, lists the Burj Khalifa in Dubai at 828 metres, completed in 2010, as the tallest building in the world.
Anas ibn Malik reports that the Prophet (ﷺ) said the Last Hour will not come until people vie with one another in boasting about mosques.
A Companion of the Prophet (ﷺ) reports that the Prophet said people of his community would drink wine, calling it by another name.
Signs still to come
The greatest signs have not come. No one has seen the False Messiah, the return of Jesus, or the sun rising from the west. The Prophet (ﷺ) also spoke of the Euphrates uncovering gold, and of Arabia returning to meadows and rivers, which has begun only in part. One long report in Sahih Muslim gives an order. The False Messiah comes, Jesus kills him, and Gog and Magog break out and are destroyed. The earth then gives its blessing. A gentle wind takes the soul of every believer, and the Hour comes on the worst of people. That last detail matters. The Hour is not a victory parade for any group. Believers are taken before it comes, so no one has a reason to long for it or hurry it.
Hudhayfa ibn Asid reports that the Prophet (ﷺ) came upon his companions discussing the Hour. He said it will not come until they see ten signs: the smoke, the False Messiah (al-Dajjal), the beast, the sun rising from the west, the descent of Jesus son of Mary, Gog and Magog, and three landslides, in the east, in the west and in Arabia. Last comes a fire from Yemen that drives people to the place of their assembly.
Abu Hurayra reports that the Prophet (ﷺ) said the Euphrates will soon uncover a treasure of gold, and whoever is present should take nothing of it.
Abu Hurayra reports that the Prophet (ﷺ) said the Hour will not come until wealth becomes so plentiful that a man takes out the zakah on his wealth and finds no one to accept it, and until the land of the Arabs returns to meadows and rivers.
Al-Nawwas ibn Sam'an reports the Prophet's (ﷺ) long description of the False Messiah (al-Dajjal). Allah will then send Jesus son of Mary, who will descend at the white minaret east of Damascus, pursue the False Messiah, catch him at the gate of Ludd and kill him. The hadith calls Jesus a prophet of Allah who, with his companions, prays to Allah for help.
| Sign | Where it stands |
|---|---|
| The Prophet's (ﷺ) death | Seen |
| The conquest of Jerusalem | Seen, in the 630s |
| Liars claiming to be messengers | Seen, from his own lifetime |
| Herdsmen competing in tall buildings | Seen |
| Wine under another name | Seen |
| Arabia returning to meadows and rivers | Begun in part |
| The Mahdi | Still to come |
| The False Messiah | Still to come |
| The return of Jesus | Still to come |
| Gog and Magog | Still to come |
| The sun rising from the west | Still to come |
The Mahdi
Mahdi means the rightly guided one. Reports in Abu Dawud say that a man of the Prophet's (ﷺ) family, from the descendants of Fatima, will fill the earth with justice as it has been filled with oppression. He is one man, and Jesus is another. He is a promise of justice after oppression, which gives believers hope. It gives no one a licence. The reports do not tell anyone to declare who he is, and those who announced a Mahdi in 1979 brought only bloodshed.
Abdullah ibn Mas'ud reports that the Prophet (ﷺ) said: if only one day of this world remained, Allah would lengthen that day until He raised up in it a man who belongs to me or to my family, whose father's name is the same as my father's, who will fill the earth with equity and justice as it has been filled with oppression and tyranny. In another wording the world will not pass away before the Arabs are ruled by a man of my family whose name is the same as mine.
Ali ibn Abi Talib reports that the Prophet (ﷺ) said: if only one day of this world remained, Allah would raise up a man from my family who would fill the earth with justice as it has been filled with oppression.
Umm Salama reports that the Prophet (ﷺ) said: the Mahdi will be of my family, of the descendants of Fatima.
In November 1979 Juhayman al-Otaybi and his followers seized the Sacred Mosque in Makkah and proclaimed one of their number, al-Qahtani, the Mahdi. Their aim was to prepare for what they believed was the coming end. Saudi forces retook the mosque, and surviving attackers were executed.
Who is the False Messiah (Dajjal)?
His title is al-Masih al-Dajjal, the False Messiah. The Prophet (ﷺ) described a young man with tightly curled hair and one blind eye. He appears on the way between Syria and Iraq and stays forty days: one like a year, one like a month, one like a week, and the rest like ordinary days. He moves like a cloud driven by the wind. He commands the sky, and rain falls for those who accept him. Those who refuse him lose their wealth. He cuts a young man in two and calls him back. None of this is his own power: God (﷾) allows it as a test. So the test is wealth, fear and wonders all at once. The Prophet (ﷺ) said to hold firm and to recite the opening verses of the chapter called The Cave. He also gave a plain mark: the False Messiah is blind in one eye, and your Lord is not. No wonder can turn a flawed man into God (﷾). The Gospels warn of the same danger: "false Christs" who "shew great signs and wonders". So a wonder alone does not make a claim true, and a person must know the truth before the test comes.
Al-Nawwas ibn Sam'an reports the Prophet's (ﷺ) long description of the False Messiah (al-Dajjal). Allah will then send Jesus son of Mary, who will descend at the white minaret east of Damascus, pursue the False Messiah, catch him at the gate of Ludd and kill him. The hadith calls Jesus a prophet of Allah who, with his companions, prays to Allah for help.
Anas reports that the Prophet (ﷺ) said no prophet was sent without warning his people against the one-eyed liar. He is blind in one eye, and your Lord is not. The word kafir (unbeliever) will be written between his eyes.
“For there shall arise false Christs, and false prophets, and shall shew great signs and wonders; insomuch that, if it were possible, they shall deceive the very elect.”
The return of Jesus
Every prophet warned his people of the False Messiah, and he will enter every town except Makkah and Madinah. Then Jesus, son of Mary, will come down at the white minaret east of Damascus and kill him at the gate of Ludd. He comes as a just ruler and a follower of Muhammad (ﷺ), and he dies as every man dies. This matters for Jews and Christians alike. Islam says the Messiah they both await is one real man, the son of Mary. He is neither God (﷾) nor a stranger yet to be born. The Qur'an says the People of the Book will believe in him before his death.
Anas reports that the Prophet (ﷺ) said no prophet was sent without warning his people against the one-eyed liar. He is blind in one eye, and your Lord is not. The word kafir (unbeliever) will be written between his eyes.
Al-Nawwas ibn Sam'an reports the Prophet's (ﷺ) long description of the False Messiah (al-Dajjal). Allah will then send Jesus son of Mary, who will descend at the white minaret east of Damascus, pursue the False Messiah, catch him at the gate of Ludd and kill him. The hadith calls Jesus a prophet of Allah who, with his companions, prays to Allah for help.
Anas reports that the Prophet (ﷺ) said there is no town the False Messiah will not enter except Makkah and Madinah, whose entrances are guarded by angels in rows.
Abu Huraira reports that the Prophet (ﷺ) swore that the son of Mary will soon descend among the Muslims as a just ruler. He will break the cross, kill the swine and end the jizya, and wealth will be so plentiful that no one will accept it. Abu Huraira then recited Qur'an 4:159: none of the People of the Book but will believe in him before his death.
Abu Hurayra reports that the Prophet (ﷺ) said there is no prophet between him and Jesus, and that Jesus will come down. He described him, and said the False Messiah will be destroyed in his time. Jesus will stay on the earth forty years, then he will die (yutawaffa), and the Muslims will pray over him.
“And there is none of the People of the Book but must believe in him before his death; and on the Day of Judgment he will be a witness against them;-”
“And (Jesus) shall be a Sign (for the coming of) the Hour (of Judgment): therefore have no doubt about the (Hour), but follow ye Me: this is a Straight Way.”
Gog and Magog
All three faiths name them. Ezekiel prophesies against "Gog, the land of Magog", and Revelation has them gathered to battle. The Qur'an tells of a barrier that holds them back until God's (﷾) promise comes, and then "they swiftly swarm from every hill". The Prophet (ﷺ) once came in fear and said a hole had opened in that barrier. In Muslim's report they come after Jesus has killed the False Messiah. God (﷾) tells him that no one can fight them, and to take the believers to safety on the mount. They drink the lake of Tiberias dry. Then Jesus and his companions pray, and God (﷾) destroys them all in a night. So this last great enemy is beaten by prayer, not by an army. That is God's (﷾) doing, and no human plan can bring it about.
“Son of man, set thy face against Gog, the land of Magog, the chief prince of Meshech and Tubal, and prophesy against him,”
“And shall go out to deceive the nations which are in the four quarters of the earth, Gog and Magog, to gather them together to battle: the number of whom is as the sand of the sea.”
“They said: "O Zul-qarnain! the Gog and Magog (People) do great mischief on earth: shall we then render thee tribute in order that thou mightest erect a barrier between us and them? He said: "(The power) in which my Lord has established me is better (than tribute): Help me therefore with strength (and labour): I will erect a strong barrier between you and them: "Bring me blocks of iron." At length, when he had filled up the space between the two steep mountain-sides, He said, "Blow (with your bellows)" Then, when he had made it (red) as fire, he said: "Bring me, that I may pour over it, molten lead." Thus were they made powerless to scale it or to dig through it. He said: "This is a mercy from my Lord: But when the promise of my Lord comes to pass, He will make it into dust; and the promise of my Lord is true."”
“Until the Gog and Magog (people) are let through (their barrier), and they swiftly swarm from every hill.”
Zaynab bint Jahsh reports that the Prophet (ﷺ) came to her in fear and said that a hole had been opened that day in the barrier of Gog and Magog, and he made a circle with his finger and thumb.
Al-Nawwas ibn Sam'an reports the Prophet's (ﷺ) long description of the False Messiah (al-Dajjal). Allah will then send Jesus son of Mary, who will descend at the white minaret east of Damascus, pursue the False Messiah, catch him at the gate of Ludd and kill him. The hadith calls Jesus a prophet of Allah who, with his companions, prays to Allah for help.
The False Messiah
He stays forty days.
Jesus comes down
He kills him at the gate of Ludd.
Gog and Magog
God (﷾) destroys them after Jesus prays.
Blessing
The earth gives its fruit.
A gentle wind
It takes the soul of every believer.
The Hour
It comes on the worst of people.
When belief no longer helps
One sign closes a door. When the sun rises from the west, everyone alive will believe. But belief then will not help a soul that did not believe before. The Qur'an says: "no good will it do to a soul to believe in them then". So the signs are not there to be watched like a countdown. They are a warning that the time to choose can run out, and for each person it runs out at death anyway.
Abu Hurayra reports that the Prophet (ﷺ) said the Hour will not come until the sun rises from the west. When people see it, all on earth will believe, and that is the time when belief will not help a soul that did not believe before (6:158).
“Are they waiting to see if the angels come to them, or thy Lord (Himself), or certain of the signs of thy Lord! the day that certain of the signs of thy Lord do come, no good will it do to a soul to believe in them then if it believed not before nor earned righteousness through its faith. Say: "Wait ye: we too are waiting."”
What Muslims are told to do: prepare, not push
A man asked the Prophet (ﷺ) when the Hour would come. He answered with a question: what have you prepared for it? He said that if the Hour comes while you hold a young plant, and you can plant it, plant it. He said that when the Euphrates uncovers gold, those present should take none of it. Facing the False Messiah, a believer is told to hold firm. In none of these reports is anyone told to make a sign happen. These signs come from God (﷾), and the Muslim's part is to stay faithful and keep doing good, right up to the last minute.
Anas ibn Malik reports that a man asked the Prophet (ﷺ) when the Hour would come. The Prophet asked what he had prepared for it. The man said he had not prepared much prayer, fasting or charity, but he loved Allah and His Messenger. The Prophet told him he would be with those he loved.
Anas ibn Malik reports that the Prophet (ﷺ) said: if the Hour comes while one of you has a young plant in his hand, and he is able to plant it first, let him plant it.
Abu Hurayra reports that the Prophet (ﷺ) said the Euphrates will soon uncover a treasure of gold, and whoever is present should take nothing of it.
Al-Nawwas ibn Sam'an reports the Prophet's (ﷺ) long description of the False Messiah (al-Dajjal). Allah will then send Jesus son of Mary, who will descend at the white minaret east of Damascus, pursue the False Messiah, catch him at the gate of Ludd and kill him. The hadith calls Jesus a prophet of Allah who, with his companions, prays to Allah for help.
Have Muslims tried to force it?
A few have, and honesty needs saying so. In 1979 Juhayman al-Otaybi and his followers seized the Sacred Mosque in Makkah and proclaimed one of their own the Mahdi, a rightly guided leader the Prophet (ﷺ) foretold. From 2014 the group called Islamic State named its magazine Dabiq, after a town in a hadith on the last days, and drew recruits with talk of a final battle. Both took blood in the name of prophecy. Both were rejected. Over 120 Muslim scholars wrote to the leader of that group and refuted him point by point. So the teaching and these men stand apart. Nothing in the reports tells anyone to declare a Mahdi or stage a sign. These men did what the Prophet (ﷺ) never asked.
In November 1979 Juhayman al-Otaybi and his followers seized the Sacred Mosque in Makkah and proclaimed one of their number, al-Qahtani, the Mahdi. Their aim was to prepare for what they believed was the coming end. Saudi forces retook the mosque, and surviving attackers were executed.
Abdullah ibn Mas'ud reports that the Prophet (ﷺ) said: if only one day of this world remained, Allah would lengthen that day until He raised up in it a man who belongs to me or to my family, whose father's name is the same as my father's, who will fill the earth with equity and justice as it has been filled with oppression and tyranny. In another wording the world will not pass away before the Arabs are ruled by a man of my family whose name is the same as mine.
The Islamic State group's magazine from 2014 to 2016. It took its name from the town of Dabiq in Syria, named in a hadith on the last days, where the group said a final battle would be fought.
Abu Hurayra reports that the Prophet (ﷺ) said the Hour will not come until the Romans land at al-A'maq or Dabiq, and an army comes out against them. The report goes on to the False Messiah and the descent of Jesus son of Mary.
Reports the open letter to Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, endorsed by more than 120 Muslim scholars around the world, among them the Grand Mufti of Egypt. It refutes the group's claims point by point from classical sources.
Judaism: a king and a rebuilt Temple
Jewish hope centres on the Messiah, a human king from David's line. Maimonides, a twelfth-century scholar whose code of law is still followed, wrote that he will restore David's kingdom, build the Temple and gather the scattered of Israel. Isaiah pictures the result: "nation shall not lift up sword against nation". Maimonides also wrote that the prophets' plain words place a war of Gog and Magog at the start of that age. The last Temple was destroyed by Rome in 70 CE, so for most of Jewish history the hope has meant waiting. This explains why the Temple is the centre of the whole story. Without it, the offerings of the Law of Moses cannot be made.
Maimonides writes that the King Messiah will arise and restore the kingdom of David; he will build the Temple and gather the dispersed of Israel. Whoever does not believe in him or await his coming denies the Torah and Moses, for the Torah foretold him in Deuteronomy 30:3-5, God gathering Israel from among the nations. A king of David's line who keeps the Torah, builds the Temple in its place and gathers the dispersed of Israel is certainly the Messiah.
“And he shall judge among the nations, and shall rebuke many people: and they shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruninghooks: nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more.”
Maimonides writes that no one can know how the events of the last days will unfold until they happen. They are not basic to the faith. No one should calculate the time of the Messiah, for the sages cursed those who do. One should wait and believe.
An eyewitness account of the Roman siege of Jerusalem under Titus in 70 CE: the Roman army broke into the city, the Temple was burned, and the city was destroyed.
What is the red heifer?
The Law of Moses commands Israel to bring "a red heifer without spot, wherein is no blemish, and upon which never came yoke". She is burned, and her ashes are mixed with water to make "a water of separation". That water cleans a person who has touched the dead. Without it, such a person "defileth the tabernacle of the Lord". Rabbis who forbid entering the site point to this uncleanness. So without the ashes, no one can serve in a Temple. That is why one animal matters so much. Maimonides wrote that only nine were ever offered, and that the tenth will be brought by the King Messiah. To the people breeding her, a red heifer is the key that opens the door to the Temple.
“This is the ordinance of the law which the Lord hath commanded, saying, Speak unto the children of Israel, that they bring thee a red heifer without spot, wherein is no blemish, and upon which never came yoke:”
“And a man that is clean shall gather up the ashes of the heifer, and lay them up without the camp in a clean place, and it shall be kept for the congregation of the children of Israel for a water of separation: it is a purification for sin.”
“He that toucheth the dead body of any man shall be unclean seven days. He shall purify himself with it on the third day, and on the seventh day he shall be clean: but if he purify not himself the third day, then the seventh day he shall not be clean. Whosoever toucheth the dead body of any man that is dead, and purifieth not himself, defileth the tabernacle of the Lord; and that soul shall be cut off from Israel: because the water of separation was not sprinkled upon him, he shall be unclean; his uncleanness is yet upon him.”
After Israel took the site in 1967, the Chief Rabbinate announced a ban on Jews entering it, on the ground of impurity from contact with the dead and because the exact place of the Temple's holiest part is not known. The strictest Orthodox camp forbids entry to all. Religious Zionists see going up as a religious duty.
Maimonides writes that nine red heifers were offered from the time the command was given until the Second Temple was destroyed. Moses offered the first and Ezra the second, and seven more followed. The tenth, he writes, will be brought by the King Messiah.
Touching the dead
A person becomes unclean.
The ashes
Her ashes in water make him clean.
The priests
Clean priests can serve in a Temple.
The Temple
So those seeking a Temple seek her first.
The red heifers from Texas
The Temple Institute in Jerusalem has looked for a red heifer for decades. Candidates in 1997 and 2002 proved unfit. In September 2022 five heifers bred by Christian ranchers in Texas were flown to Israel, in a joint effort between the Institute and a Christian ministry, Boneh Israel. In July 2025 one was burned as a practice run, and the Institute said the ashes were not valid. By August 2025 it said every candidate had been ruled out, because of hairs that were not red. In 2026 a red calf named Tamima was born in the Galilee, bred from American semen. She too was ruled out, because of a blemish from an ear tag. So as of today no valid ashes exist, and no such ceremony has counted. But the effort goes on, and the Institute calls the ashes a major step toward the Temple.
Founded in 1987 by Rabbi Yisrael Ariel. Its stated aim is to build the Third Temple on the Temple Mount and bring back the offerings. It has made over ninety Temple items and the priests' garments. It named red heifer candidates in 1997 and 2002 that later proved unfit. A report cited there says two Israeli ministries gave it between NIS 300,000 and 700,000 over a decade.
Reports that red heifers bred by Christian ranchers in Texas were brought to Israel in September 2022, in a joint effort by the Christian ministry Boneh Israel and the Temple Institute. They were kept at the Ancient Shiloh heritage site.
Reports the Temple Institute's statement that the burning of a heifer on 1 July was only an exercise and that its ashes are completely ineligible. The animal was one of the calves brought from Texas, and it had defects.
Quotes the Temple Institute's post that "all our efforts so far have been frustrated by the appearance of more than one non-red hair on all our potential candidates". It reports a test run with a disqualified heifer. The Institute calls making the ashes a major step toward building the Temple and renewing the offerings.
Reports that a calf named Tamima was born completely red in the Galilee, from a breeding programme using semen imported from the United States. Rabbi Azariah Ariel, who leads the Temple Institute's red heifer project, ruled her disqualified for the rite because of a blemish left by an ear tag.
- 1987
The Temple Institute
It is founded in Jerusalem.
- 1997, 2002
Two candidates
Both later prove unfit.
- September 2022
Five from Texas
Bred by Christian ranchers and flown to Israel.
- July 2025
A practice run
One is used for a trial ceremony. The Institute says the ashes are not valid.
- August 2025
All ruled out
The Institute says hairs that were not red appeared on every candidate.
- 2026
Tamima
A red calf is born in the Galilee, then ruled out over an ear tag blemish.
Who is working for a Third Temple?
The Temple Institute was founded in 1987. Its stated aim is to build the Third Temple on the site in Jerusalem. It has already made over ninety Temple items and the priests' garments. Other groups work on the ground. For decades, under an unwritten arrangement, Jews could visit the Al-Aqsa compound, which they call the Temple Mount, but only Muslims could worship there. That is changing. Large groups now pray openly under police guard, and a government minister has said "Today, we are masters of the Temple Mount". The group Beyadenu says almost 69,000 Jewish worshippers came last year, nearly five times the figure of a decade before. Its spokesman says: "Our main aim is the Temple". So the cause of Jewish prayer there, once on the fringe, now has a government minister on its side.
Founded in 1987 by Rabbi Yisrael Ariel. Its stated aim is to build the Third Temple on the Temple Mount and bring back the offerings. It has made over ninety Temple items and the priests' garments. It named red heifer candidates in 1997 and 2002 that later proved unfit. A report cited there says two Israeli ministries gave it between NIS 300,000 and 700,000 over a decade.
Under unwritten understandings since 1967, Jews could visit but only Muslims could worship, and a Jordanian-run Waqf ran the site. Large groups now pray openly under police guard. The group Beyadenu says almost 69,000 Jewish worshippers visited last year, nearly five times the figure of a decade before. Its spokesman says "Our main aim is the Temple". The minister Itamar Ben-Gvir said in September 2026: "Today, we are masters of the Temple Mount". Prominent Israeli rabbis say visiting is forbidden. Prime Minister Netanyahu insists nothing has changed. King Abdullah II told the UN on 22 September 2026 that Jordan would uphold the status quo.
Many religious Jews say wait
These groups do not speak for Judaism. Since 1967 Israel's Chief Rabbinate has ruled that Jews may not enter the site, because of impurity and the holiness of the place. The strictest Orthodox camp still forbids entry to all, though Religious Zionists disagree. The Talmud records oaths that the Jews would not go up to the land by force, and later rabbis read this as a ban on forcing the end. It also curses those who calculate the end, because when the date passes, people say the Messiah will never come. Maimonides repeats that warning. He says that the order of these events is not part of the faith, and that one should wait. So by the teaching of many of its own greatest authorities, pushing the end is itself a fault. Muslims and many religious Jews agree on this one point: the time is God's (﷾).
After Israel took the site in 1967, the Chief Rabbinate announced a ban on Jews entering it, on the ground of impurity from contact with the dead and because the exact place of the Temple's holiest part is not known. The strictest Orthodox camp forbids entry to all. Religious Zionists see going up as a religious duty.
Explaining the three oaths in the Song of Songs (2:7, 3:5, 8:4), Rabbi Yosei son of Rabbi Hanina says: one, that the Jews should not go up to the Land of Israel "as a wall", all together, but little by little; one, that they should not rebel against the rule of the nations of the world; and one, that God made the nations swear not to oppress the Jews too much.
Rabbi Shmuel bar Nahmani, in the name of Rabbi Yonatan, curses those who calculate the end of days. When the date they worked out comes and the Messiah does not, people will say he is never coming.
Maimonides writes that no one can know how the events of the last days will unfold until they happen. They are not basic to the faith. No one should calculate the time of the Messiah, for the sages cursed those who do. One should wait and believe.
Christianity: the return of Jesus
All the main churches teach that Jesus will return in glory and judge the living and the dead. The New Testament speaks of a "man of sin" who "sitteth in the temple of God", and Revelation gives the word Armageddon. Churches read these in very different ways. In America the belief runs strong. In a Pew survey of 2022, 39 per cent of adults said we are living in the end times, and so did 63 per cent of evangelicals. The view of the end held by tens of millions can shape how a powerful country treats one small piece of land.
“Which also said, Ye men of Galilee, why stand ye gazing up into heaven? this same Jesus, which is taken up from you into heaven, shall so come in like manner as ye have seen him go into heaven.”
“When the Son of man shall come in his glory, and all the holy angels with him, then shall he sit upon the throne of his glory:”
“Let no man deceive you by any means: for that day shall not come, except there come a falling away first, and that man of sin be revealed, the son of perdition; Who opposeth and exalteth himself above all that is called God, or that is worshipped; so that he as God sitteth in the temple of God, shewing himself that he is God.”
“And he gathered them together into a place called in the Hebrew tongue Armageddon.”
A survey of 10,156 U.S. adults in April 2022. 39 per cent say we are living in the end times: 63 per cent of evangelical Protestants, 76 per cent of historically Black Protestants and 27 per cent of Catholics. 55 per cent of adults say Jesus will return to earth someday, including 92 per cent of evangelicals. 10 per cent say he will definitely or probably return in their lifetime.
- 39%Of adults: we are living in the end times
- 63%Of evangelicals say the same
- 27%Of Catholics say the same
- 92%Of evangelicals: Jesus will return someday
The Rapture, the Tribulation and the Third Temple
One Protestant system is behind most of the news. It is called dispensationalism, and John Nelson Darby set it out in the nineteenth century. The Scofield Bible spread it, and Hal Lindsey and the Left Behind novels made it popular. It puts Israel at the centre of the timetable. Christians are taken up in the Rapture. Seven years of great suffering, the Tribulation, follow, and an Antichrist rises. It rests on verses such as Daniel's words that a ruler will "cause the sacrifice and the oblation to cease". Sacrifices can only cease if they have started again. So on this reading a Temple must first be rebuilt. That is why some Christians watch a cow in Israel so closely. They see a rebuilt Temple as a necessary step, even though they expect it to be defiled.
A Protestant system set out by John Nelson Darby in the nineteenth century and spread by the Scofield Reference Bible. Most of its followers expect Christians to be taken up in a rapture before a seven-year tribulation. It treats Israel as distinct from the Church and often links the modern state to prophecy. Hal Lindsey's popular order runs: Israel in 1948, Jerusalem's holy sites in 1967, a rebuilt Temple, an Antichrist, the rapture, seven years of tribulation, Armageddon and a thousand-year reign of Christ.
“For this we say unto you by the word of the Lord, that we which are alive and remain unto the coming of the Lord shall not prevent them which are asleep. For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God: and the dead in Christ shall rise first: Then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air: and so shall we ever be with the Lord.”
“And he shall confirm the covenant with many for one week: and in the midst of the week he shall cause the sacrifice and the oblation to cease, and for the overspreading of abominations he shall make it desolate, even until the consummation, and that determined shall be poured upon the desolate.”
“When ye therefore shall see the abomination of desolation, spoken of by Daniel the prophet, stand in the holy place, (whoso readeth, let him understand:)”
“Let no man deceive you by any means: for that day shall not come, except there come a falling away first, and that man of sin be revealed, the son of perdition; Who opposeth and exalteth himself above all that is called God, or that is worshipped; so that he as God sitteth in the temple of God, shewing himself that he is God.”
Reads the rebirth of Israel in 1948 as the budding fig tree of Matthew 24, takes a biblical generation as about forty years, and suggests that the end-time events could come within about forty years of 1948.
1948, 1967
Israel, then Jerusalem's holy sites.
A rebuilt Temple
This has not happened.
The Antichrist and the Rapture
He rises, and Christians are taken up.
Seven years
The Tribulation.
Armageddon
The final battle.
A thousand years
Christ reigns from Jerusalem.
Are Christians encouraging it?
Some are, in deeds as well as words. Christian ranchers bred the Texas heifers, and a Christian ministry helped to bring them to Israel. Christians United for Israel claims over 10 million members. One of its state directors has said its support is not about the end times, because Christians believe nothing they do can speed that up. Many evangelicals would agree. But the belief reaches high office. In 2026 the US ambassador to Israel said it would be fine if Israel "took it all", speaking of the Bible's borders, and later called that "somewhat hyperbolic". Other Christians reject all of this. The heads of the churches in Jerusalem declared in 2006 that Christian Zionist doctrines are false teaching. So this is one stream of Christianity, not the whole river, but it has reached the seats of power.
Reports that red heifers bred by Christian ranchers in Texas were brought to Israel in September 2022, in a joint effort by the Christian ministry Boneh Israel and the Temple Institute. They were kept at the Ancient Shiloh heritage site.
An American Christian group incorporated in 2006 by John Hagee. It claims over 10 million members. One of its state directors said its support for Israel is not tied to the end times, because Christians believe nothing they do can speed that up.
Reports the US ambassador to Israel, Mike Huckabee, telling an interviewer that it would be fine if Israel "took it all", speaking of the Bible's borders. He later called the remark "somewhat hyperbolic". The article describes the belief that non-Christians who do not convert at Christ's return face damnation. It reports the heads of the churches in Jerusalem calling Christian Zionism a damaging ideology.
A statement of August 2006 signed by the Latin Patriarch of Jerusalem and the Syrian Orthodox, Anglican and Lutheran heads in the city. It rejects Christian Zionist doctrines as false teaching.
Why this Christian hope clashes with the New Testament
The New Testament names these very ashes. Hebrews sets "the ashes of an heifer" beside "the blood of Christ", and says the second is far greater. It then says: "there is no more offering for sin". So a Christian who helps bring back the ashes is working toward something his own book says is finished. The alliance has a second crack. The Temple groups await a Messiah who is not Jesus. Their Christian helpers expect those same Jews to accept Jesus or face damnation. Each side thinks the other is wrong about the very thing they are building. Two groups with opposite ends cannot both be carrying out God's (﷾) plan.
“For if the blood of bulls and of goats, and the ashes of an heifer sprinkling the unclean, sanctifieth to the purifying of the flesh: How much more shall the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered himself without spot to God, purge your conscience from dead works to serve the living God?”
“Now where remission of these is, there is no more offering for sin.”
Reports the US ambassador to Israel, Mike Huckabee, telling an interviewer that it would be fine if Israel "took it all", speaking of the Bible's borders. He later called the remark "somewhat hyperbolic". The article describes the belief that non-Christians who do not convert at Christ's return face damnation. It reports the heads of the churches in Jerusalem calling Christian Zionism a damaging ideology.
| Point | Temple groups | Their Christian helpers |
|---|---|---|
| The Messiah | A king who has not yet come | Jesus, returning |
| The Temple | The goal | A step, to be defiled |
| The offerings | To be renewed | Finished, says Hebrews |
What it means for Al-Aqsa
The Qur'an calls this place "the farthest Mosque, whose precincts We did bless". The Prophet (ﷺ) said it was the second mosque built on earth. A Third Temple would stand where the Dome of the Rock now stands, inside the same compound. So plans for a Temple are plans for a place Muslims hold sacred. People have already tried to force it. In 1969 an Australian Christian set fire to Al-Aqsa, hoping to hasten the second coming. In the 1980s Israeli militants planned to blow up the Dome of the Rock to prepare for a Third Temple, and were caught. Jordan, the custodian of the site, warned the United Nations in 2026. This is why a story about a cow is not a small story. One reckless act at this holy place could bring disaster on many innocent people. Islam's command to Muslims stays the same: "let not the hatred of others to you make you swerve to wrong and depart from justice".
“Glory to (Allah) Who did take His servant for a Journey by night from the Sacred Mosque to the farthest Mosque, whose precincts We did bless,- in order that We might show him some of Our Signs: for He is the One Who heareth and seeth (all things).”
Abu Dharr asked the Prophet (ﷺ) which mosque was built first on earth. He said the Sacred Mosque in Makkah, and then the mosque of al-Aqsa in Jerusalem, forty years later.
Founded in 1987 by Rabbi Yisrael Ariel. Its stated aim is to build the Third Temple on the Temple Mount and bring back the offerings. It has made over ninety Temple items and the priests' garments. It named red heifer candidates in 1997 and 2002 that later proved unfit. A report cited there says two Israeli ministries gave it between NIS 300,000 and 700,000 over a decade.
An Australian Christian who set fire to the Al-Aqsa Mosque in 1969. He said he was acting as the Lord's emissary and wanted to help the Jews rebuild the Temple, which he believed would hasten the second coming of Christ. An Israeli court found him insane.
On 21 August 1969 a fire destroyed the twelfth-century pulpit of Saladin and damaged the mosque's southern part. The attack was a key spur to the founding of the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation.
A militant Israeli group uncovered in 1984. Among its plans was to destroy the Dome of the Rock, to awaken Jews and prepare the way for a Third Temple. The plan was found out before it was carried out, and members of the group were tried and jailed.
Under unwritten understandings since 1967, Jews could visit but only Muslims could worship, and a Jordanian-run Waqf ran the site. Large groups now pray openly under police guard. The group Beyadenu says almost 69,000 Jewish worshippers visited last year, nearly five times the figure of a decade before. Its spokesman says "Our main aim is the Temple". The minister Itamar Ben-Gvir said in September 2026: "Today, we are masters of the Temple Mount". Prominent Israeli rabbis say visiting is forbidden. Prime Minister Netanyahu insists nothing has changed. King Abdullah II told the UN on 22 September 2026 that Jordan would uphold the status quo.
“O ye who believe! stand out firmly for Allah, as witnesses to fair dealing, and let not the hatred of others to you make you swerve to wrong and depart from justice. Be just: that is next to piety: and fear Allah. For Allah is well-acquainted with all that ye do.”
- 1969
Al-Aqsa set on fire
A Christian hoped to hasten the second coming.
- 1979
The Sacred Mosque seized
Armed men proclaimed a false Mahdi.
- 1984
The Dome of the Rock plot
Jewish militants were caught before acting.
- 2014
Dabiq
An extremist group drew recruits with talk of a last battle.
Is the red heifer in the Qur'an?
No. The second chapter of the Qur'an is named The Heifer, and people often link the two. But it tells another story. A man had been killed, and the people disputed who did it. God (﷾) told them to sacrifice a heifer and strike the body with a piece of it. They kept asking questions to delay. The heifer there is "fawn-coloured", and the purpose is to reveal a crime. It has nothing to do with a Temple or the last days. The Qur'an and the authentic hadith name no red heifer and no Third Temple among the signs of the Hour. So Muslims should not read today's headlines into the hadith. Islam's signs are what the Prophet (ﷺ) said, and nothing added.
“And remember Moses said to his people: "Allah commands that ye sacrifice a heifer." They said: "Makest thou a laughing-stock of us?" He said: "Allah save me from being an ignorant (fool)!" They said: "Beseech on our behalf Thy Lord to make plain to us what (heifer) it is!" He said; "He says: The heifer should be neither too old nor too young, but of middling age. Now do what ye are commanded!" They said: "Beseech on our behalf Thy Lord to make plain to us Her colour." He said: "He says: A fawn-coloured heifer, pure and rich in tone, the admiration of beholders!" They said: "Beseech on our behalf Thy Lord to make plain to us what she is: To us are all heifers alike: We wish indeed for guidance, if Allah wills." He said: "He says: A heifer not trained to till the soil or water the fields; sound and without blemish." They said: "Now hast thou brought the truth." Then they offered her in sacrifice, but not with good-will. Remember ye slew a man and fell into a dispute among yourselves as to the crime: But Allah was to bring forth what ye did hide. So We said: "Strike the (body) with a piece of the (heifer)." Thus Allah bringeth the dead to life and showeth you His Signs: Perchance ye may understand.”
Hudhayfa ibn Asid reports that the Prophet (ﷺ) came upon his companions discussing the Hour. He said it will not come until they see ten signs: the smoke, the False Messiah (al-Dajjal), the beast, the sun rising from the west, the descent of Jesus son of Mary, Gog and Magog, and three landslides, in the east, in the west and in Arabia. Last comes a fire from Yemen that drives people to the place of their assembly.
One title, three Messiahs
Messiah means the anointed one. Jews, Christians and Muslims all use the title, and they mean three different things. Jews await a human king of David's line who has not yet come: "a King shall reign and prosper". Maimonides wrote that a man who is killed before he finishes the work is not the promised one. Christians hold that Jesus is the Messiah, that he died on the cross, and that he will return in glory as God the Son. The Qur'an says "Christ Jesus the son of Mary was (no more than) a messenger of Allah", and of his enemies it says "they killed him not". So Islam shares something with each. With the Jews, it says the Messiah is a man and not God. With the Christians, it says the Messiah is Jesus. And because he was not killed, his work is not over. Muslims hold that here the two hopes meet in one man. Christians also await an Antichrist, and Muslims the False Messiah, so both expect a great deceiver first.
“Behold, the days come, saith the Lord, that I will raise unto David a righteous Branch, and a King shall reign and prosper, and shall execute judgment and justice in the earth.”
Halakha 4 in the uncensored text. A king of David's line who studies the Torah and keeps the commandments, compels Israel to walk in them and fights the wars of the LORD is presumed to be the Messiah. If he succeeds, rebuilds the Temple in its place and gathers Israel's exiles, he is surely the Messiah; the texts printed by Mechon Mamre and Sefaria's Wikisource add that he defeats all the nations around him. If he does not succeed, or is killed, he is surely not the one the Torah promised: he is like the worthy kings of David's line who died, and God raised him only to test the many (Daniel 11:35). Then Maimonides writes of Yeshua ha-Notzri (Jesus the Nazarene), who imagined he would be the Messiah and was killed by the court (nehrag be-veit din). He applies Daniel 11:14 to him. The prophets, he says, foretold a Messiah who would save Israel, gather its exiles and strengthen its commandments; Jesus caused Israel to be destroyed by the sword and scattered, caused the Torah to be changed (le-hachalif ha-Torah), and led most of the world to worship a god besides the LORD. Then he says that all the matters of Jesus the Nazarene and of the Ishmaelite who came after him serve only to prepare the way for the King Messiah, and to set the whole world right to serve the LORD together, citing Zephaniah 3:9. Through them the world has been filled with talk of the Messiah, the Torah and the commandments, spread to far islands and many peoples. Those peoples debate the commandments. Some say they were true but have lapsed in this age and were not meant for all generations; others say they hold hidden meanings, not their plain sense, and that the Messiah has already come and revealed them. When the true Messiah comes, those peoples will know that their fathers inherited falsehood and that their prophets and fathers misled them. Printed editions were censored. On Sefaria (Torat Emet Hebrew) the failed claimant is 11:5 and the lines on Jesus and the Ishmaelite are 11:6-9; Sefaria's layer of censorship omissions reinserted marks 11:5-9 as cut. Soloweyczik's English of 1863 keeps 11:5 but not the names, the court, the changed Torah, the other god or the misled prophets.
“When the Son of man shall come in his glory, and all the holy angels with him, then shall he sit upon the throne of his glory:”
“O People of the Book! Commit no excesses in your religion: Nor say of Allah aught but the truth. Christ Jesus the son of Mary was (no more than) a messenger of Allah, and His Word, which He bestowed on Mary, and a spirit proceeding from Him: so believe in Allah and His messengers. Say not "Trinity": desist: it will be better for you: for Allah is one Allah: Glory be to Him: (far exalted is He) above having a son. To Him belong all things in the heavens and on earth. And enough is Allah as a Disposer of affairs.”
“That they said (in boast), "We killed Christ Jesus the son of Mary, the Messenger of Allah";- but they killed him not, nor crucified him, but so it was made to appear to them, and those who differ therein are full of doubts, with no (certain) knowledge, but only conjecture to follow, for of a surety they killed him not:-”
“And (Jesus) shall be a Sign (for the coming of) the Hour (of Judgment): therefore have no doubt about the (Hour), but follow ye Me: this is a Straight Way.”
“Little children, it is the last time: and as ye have heard that antichrist shall come, even now are there many antichrists; whereby we know that it is the last time.”
| Point | Judaism | Christianity | Islam |
|---|---|---|---|
| Who he is | A human king | Jesus, God the Son | Jesus, a human messenger |
| Has he come? | Not yet | Yes, and he will return | Yes, and he will return |
| His work at the end | Rebuild the Temple, gather Israel | Judge the living and the dead | Kill the False Messiah, rule justly, then die |
| The false one | A claimant who fails is not him | The Antichrist | The False Messiah |
Latter-day Saints: Zion in America
Latter-day Saints expect Jesus to return and reign on the earth. Their tenth Article of Faith says "Zion (the New Jerusalem) will be built upon the American continent". A revelation of 1831 named Independence, Missouri as its centre. Church members prepare by gathering people into the faith, not by building up a sign. Joseph Smith said in 1835 that "even fifty-six years should wind up the scene". Latter-day Saint scholars treat this as a passing remark, not a revelation, and the time passed in 1891. So the hope here rests on a holy city placed in America in the nineteenth century, which the Qur'an nowhere mentions.
“We believe in the literal gathering of Israel and in the restoration of the Ten Tribes; that Zion (the New Jerusalem) will be built upon the American continent; that Christ will reign personally upon the earth; and, that the earth will be renewed and receive its paradisiacal glory.”
A revelation of July 1831 named Missouri as the place for the city of Zion, with Independence as its centre. The early gathering grew from the desire to prepare for the second coming of Christ.
Discusses Joseph Smith's remark of 14 February 1835 that "even fifty-six years should wind up the scene", and treats it as a free comment and not a revelation.
Hinduism: the last of four ages
Hindu teaching sees time as a wheel of four ages. We live in the last and worst, the Kali age. By the common reckoning it began in 3102 BCE and lasts 432,000 years, so over 426,000 remain. The Vishnu Purana says that near its close Kalki, a descent of the divine, will be born in a Brahmin family and restore the age of purity. Then the wheel turns again. With hundreds of thousands of years to run, no one is trying to hurry it. This site does not claim that Kalki is Muhammad (ﷺ), and the texts do not allow it. The great difference from Islam is that this world has no final day. The wheel only turns.
In his notes to the first chapter, Burgess explains that the Surya Siddhanta, a classical Hindu treatise on astronomy, and the treatises that follow its method reckon everything from the start of the present age, the Kali yuga. They set that start at midnight on the meridian of Ujjain, between 17 and 18 February 3102 BC.
The last and worst of the four ages in Hindu teaching. Texts give it 432,000 years. By the common reckoning it began in 3102 BCE, so over 426,000 years remain. It is followed by a new cycle of ages.
“When the practices taught by the Vedas and the institutes of law shall nearly have ceased, and the close of the Kali age shall be nigh, a portion of that divine being who exists of his own spiritual nature in the character of Brahma, and who is the beginning and the end, and who comprehends all things, shall descend upon earth: he will be born in the family of Vishńuyaśas, an eminent Brahman of Sambhala village, as Kalki, endowed with the eight superhuman faculties.”
Buddhism: decline, renewal and Metteyya
A Buddhist discourse says human life will shrink to ten years, with seven days of swords. Then people will turn back to good, and lives will lengthen to 80,000 years. In that time a new Buddha, Metteyya (Maitreya), will arise. Another discourse says that seven suns will one day burn the earth, leaving no ash. The point there is not a timetable. The Buddha uses it to teach that "conditions are impermanent", so that people let go of this world. Buddhists are not trying to hasten it. As with the Hindu wheel, the world ends and begins again, and no single Day gathers everyone before God (﷾).
“And the Blessed One named Metteyya will arise in the world—perfected, a fully awakened Buddha,”
“this great earth and Sineru the king of mountains erupt in one burning mass of fire.”
Sikhs and Jains: no Last Day
Sikhs do not hold that the world will end or that a day of doom will come. What matters to them is how a person lives now, and union with God (﷾). Jains hold that time has no beginning and no end. It turns for ever in a falling half and a rising half, and we are near the bottom of the falling half. Neither faith has anything to bring forward. So the idea of pushing the end is not found everywhere. It needs a belief in one final event, a sacred place, and people who think they can move God's (﷾) hand.
A Sikh reply stating that Sikhs do not hold that the world will end or that a day of doom will come.
Jains hold that time has no beginning or end. It turns in endless cycles, each with a falling half and a rising half of six eras. The present era is in the falling half, and its last two eras are of 21,000 years each.
Those who say the promise has already come
Two later movements answer the question another way. Bahá'ís hold that Bahá'u'lláh, in the nineteenth century, was the one promised by the earlier religions. Ahmadis hold that Mirza Ghulam Ahmad of Qadian was the promised Messiah. Each takes a promise of the last days and fits it to a man who has already lived and died. But the signs the Prophet (ﷺ) named have not come: the sun has not risen from the west, and no one has seen Jesus, son of Mary, come down. So a claim that the promise is already met does not fit what was promised.
The nineteenth-century founder of the Bahá'í Faith. Bahá'ís hold him to be the one promised by earlier religions.
Mirza Ghulam Ahmad writes that the Jews said Jesus would appear only after Elijah had returned to earth, and asks whether Elijah came. He uses this to argue that promised signs need not be fulfilled in the literal way people expect, and warns Muslims against the Jews' error of insisting on their own reading.
Hudhayfa ibn Asid reports that the Prophet (ﷺ) came upon his companions discussing the Hour. He said it will not come until they see ten signs: the smoke, the False Messiah (al-Dajjal), the beast, the sun rising from the west, the descent of Jesus son of Mary, Gog and Magog, and three landslides, in the east, in the west and in Arabia. Last comes a fire from Yemen that drives people to the place of their assembly.
Abu Huraira reports that the Prophet (ﷺ) swore that the son of Mary will soon descend among the Muslims as a just ruler. He will break the cross, kill the swine and end the jizya, and wealth will be so plentiful that no one will accept it. Abu Huraira then recited Qur'an 4:159: none of the People of the Book but will believe in him before his death.
No religion: an end without a Judge
People with no religion have their own end times. In January 2026 the scientists behind the Doomsday Clock set it at 85 seconds to midnight, the closest it has ever been, over nuclear weapons, climate and new technology. So the fear of an ending does not belong to religion. The difference is what comes after. Without God (﷾), an ending is only an ending. Those who did great wrong and those who suffered it end the same way, and no one sets it right. Islam says that this is not the last word: "anyone who has done an atom's weight of good, see it!"
On 27 January 2026 the scientists who set the clock moved it to 85 seconds to midnight, the closest it has been, citing nuclear weapons, climate change and new technology.
“Then shall anyone who has done an atom's weight of good, see it! And anyone who has done an atom's weight of evil, shall see it.”
What has come, and what has not
Every faith with a story of the end has signs it says have come, and signs it still awaits. Some Jews call the state of 1948 the first flowering of redemption, and many Orthodox Jews reject that. Many Christians point to wars and earthquakes. Yet the Gospel has Jesus say of wars that "the end is not yet". Wars and earthquakes come in every age, so they cannot show the time. The same goes for general signs in any faith. What carries weight is a detail no one could have guessed. In every faith the deciding event has not come. No Jewish Messiah has built a Temple, no Antichrist has appeared, Kalki has not been born and Metteyya has not arisen. So anyone who says the end has arrived has gone ahead of his own book.
Written in 1948 by Yitzhak HaLevi Herzog, the first Chief Rabbi of Israel, and edited by S. Y. Agnon. It calls the state "the initial flowering of our redemption". Many synagogues recite it; mainstream Haredi Jews generally do not, partly because of that phrase.
“And ye shall hear of wars and rumours of wars: see that ye be not troubled: for all these things must come to pass, but the end is not yet. For nation shall rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom: and there shall be famines, and pestilences, and earthquakes, in divers places.”
Maimonides writes that the King Messiah will arise and restore the kingdom of David; he will build the Temple and gather the dispersed of Israel. Whoever does not believe in him or await his coming denies the Torah and Moses, for the Torah foretold him in Deuteronomy 30:3-5, God gathering Israel from among the nations. A king of David's line who keeps the Torah, builds the Temple in its place and gathers the dispersed of Israel is certainly the Messiah.
“When the practices taught by the Vedas and the institutes of law shall nearly have ceased, and the close of the Kali age shall be nigh, a portion of that divine being who exists of his own spiritual nature in the character of Brahma, and who is the beginning and the end, and who comprehends all things, shall descend upon earth: he will be born in the family of Vishńuyaśas, an eminent Brahman of Sambhala village, as Kalki, endowed with the eight superhuman faculties.”
“And the Blessed One named Metteyya will arise in the world—perfected, a fully awakened Buddha,”
Hudhayfa ibn Asid reports that the Prophet (ﷺ) came upon his companions discussing the Hour. He said it will not come until they see ten signs: the smoke, the False Messiah (al-Dajjal), the beast, the sun rising from the west, the descent of Jesus son of Mary, Gog and Magog, and three landslides, in the east, in the west and in Arabia. Last comes a fire from Yemen that drives people to the place of their assembly.
| Faith | Said to have come | Still awaited |
|---|---|---|
| Islam | Towers, false prophets and more | The False Messiah, Jesus, the sun from the west |
| Judaism | Some see the first flowering in 1948; others do not | The Messiah and the Temple |
| Christianity | Many point to Israel in 1948 | A Temple, the Antichrist, the return |
| Latter-day Saints | The gathering has begun | The New Jerusalem |
| Hinduism | The Kali age of decline | Kalki |
| Buddhism | Nothing fixed | Lives of ten years, then Metteyya |
A prophecy you arrange proves nothing
A true prophecy is a thing foretold that no one could have made happen. If believers breed a cow by design, fly her across the world and build the building, nothing has been foretold. It has been carried out. It tells us what those people want, not what God (﷾) has decreed. Dates fail in the same way, and a separate page sets out those that passed. The Torah gives the test: if the thing does not come to pass, the Lord has not spoken it. Compare the herdsmen building towers, which the Prophet (ﷺ) foretold in seventh-century Arabia. They did not build them to prove him right, and that is why the words carry weight.
“When a prophet speaketh in the name of the Lord, if the thing follow not, nor come to pass, that is the thing which the Lord hath not spoken, but the prophet hath spoken it presumptuously: thou shalt not be afraid of him.”
Umar ibn al-Khattab reports that a stranger in very white clothes came and questioned the Prophet (ﷺ) about Islam, faith and excellence in worship, and then about the Hour. The Prophet said the one asked knew no more than the one asking, and gave two of its signs: a slave woman will give birth to her mistress, and you will see barefoot, poorly clothed, destitute shepherds competing with one another in raising tall buildings. Afterwards the Prophet told Umar the stranger was the angel Gabriel, who had come to teach them their religion.
Abu Hurayra reports that the angel Gabriel came to the Prophet (ﷺ) in the form of a man and asked him about faith, Islam and excellence in worship, and then when the Hour would come. The Prophet answered that the one being asked knew no more about it than the one asking. He described some of its signs, said the Hour is one of five things that no one knows except Allah, and recited Qur'an 31:34.
A history of Christian end-time expectation from the early church to the late twentieth century, recording the many dates that were set for the end or for Christ's return and then passed.
How Muslims read these older books
This page quotes the Bible because Jews and Christians believe it. Muslims do not hold today's Bible to be God's (﷾) revelation as it was given. The Injil given to Jesus is lost, and it is not today's New Testament. Belief in the books God (﷾) revealed is still an article of faith. The Prophet (ﷺ) told Muslims neither to believe nor to deny what the People of the Book report. Where the Bible agrees with the Qur'an it may be true, and where it contradicts the Qur'an it is set aside. The Qur'an is the measure, and Muslims follow only the Qur'an and the authentic hadith. So when this page uses the Bible, it tests a claim by the book of those who make it. Islam does not rest on it.
“The Messenger believeth in what hath been revealed to him from his Lord, as do the men of faith. Each one (of them) believeth in Allah, His angels, His books, and His messengers. "We make no distinction (they say) between one and another of His messengers." And they say: "We hear, and we obey: (We seek) Thy forgiveness, our Lord, and to Thee is the end of all journeys."”
“O ye who believe! Believe in Allah and His Messenger, and the scripture which He hath sent to His Messenger and the scripture which He sent to those before (him). Any who denieth Allah, His angels, His Books, His Messengers, and the Day of Judgment, hath gone far, far astray.”
Abu Hurayra reports that the People of the Book used to read the Torah in Hebrew and explain it in Arabic to the Muslims. The Prophet (ﷺ) told the Muslims neither to believe them nor to call them liars, but to say: we believe in Allah and in what was revealed to us (Qur'an 2:136).
“To thee We sent the Scripture in truth, confirming the scripture that came before it, and guarding it in safety: so judge between them by what Allah hath revealed, and follow not their vain desires, diverging from the Truth that hath come to thee. To each among you have we prescribed a law and an open way. If Allah had so willed, He would have made you a single people, but (His plan is) to test you in what He hath given you: so strive as in a race in all virtues. The goal of you all is to Allah; it is He that will show you the truth of the matters in which ye dispute;”
Islam's answer: be ready
Every faith on this page asks you to look at the future. Islam also asks you to look at yourself. The Hour will come, and God (﷾) alone knows when. Your own death could come at any time, and it closes the same door. "Every soul shall have a taste of death". On that Day no temple and no land will speak for you, only your faith, your deeds and the mercy of God (﷾). Islam offers one God (﷾), the same Jesus Christians are waiting for, as a servant and not as God, and a Book that sets no date. It does not ask you to bring the end. It asks you to be ready. Read the Qur'an for yourself, and see what it asks of you today.
“They ask thee about the (final) Hour - when will be its appointed time? Say: "The knowledge thereof is with my Lord (alone): None but He can reveal as to when it will occur. Heavy were its burden through the heavens and the earth. Only, all of a sudden will it come to you." They ask thee as if thou Wert eager in search thereof: Say: "The knowledge thereof is with Allah (alone), but most men know not."”
“Every soul shall have a taste of death: And only on the Day of Judgment shall you be paid your full recompense. Only he who is saved far from the Fire and admitted to the Garden will have attained the object (of Life): For the life of this world is but goods and chattels of deception.”
Anas ibn Malik reports that a man asked the Prophet (ﷺ) when the Hour would come. The Prophet asked what he had prepared for it. The man said he had not prepared much prayer, fasting or charity, but he loved Allah and His Messenger. The Prophet told him he would be with those he loved.
“And (Jesus) shall be a Sign (for the coming of) the Hour (of Judgment): therefore have no doubt about the (Hour), but follow ye Me: this is a Straight Way.”
Perspectives
The Third Temple must be built now
Temple groups say that the Torah commands a Temple and its offerings, so Jews should prepare for it now and not wait.
The Torah commands the red heifer and the Temple service, and a command should be obeyed, not postponed.
Rebuttal
Maimonides, a leading authority in Jewish law, says it is the King Messiah who builds the Temple and brings the tenth heifer. The Talmud curses those who calculate the end, and the Chief Rabbinate has long ruled that Jews may not enter the site. By their own authorities, this is not their work to do.
A red calf born in Israel is a sign that the time is near.
Rebuttal
She was bred by a programme set up to produce her, and she was then ruled unfit. A planned outcome is not a sign, and the candidates so far have all failed.
Israel is God's clock
Many evangelicals say that modern Israel and a coming Temple fulfil Bible prophecy, and that Christians should support them.
The return of Jews to the land in 1948 fulfils prophecy and shows that the end is near.
Rebuttal
Hal Lindsey tied the end to a generation after 1948, and that time has passed. The Bible's order of return puts repentance first, and the state was founded by a secular movement. Jesus said no one knows the day.
Paul says the man of sin will sit in the temple of God, so a Temple must be rebuilt.
Rebuttal
Even if that is so, the verse describes what an enemy of God (﷾) will do. It tells no one to build the place for him. Hebrews says that there is no more offering for sin.
Islam's end times are violent too
Some critics say that Islam's teaching on the last days inspires violence just as much.
Groups such as Islamic State acted on Muslim prophecies of a final battle.
Rebuttal
They used the reports, but they did not follow them. Nothing tells anyone to make those events happen. Over 120 Muslim scholars answered that group in writing.
Muslims wait for a Mahdi who will conquer the world.
Rebuttal
The reports say he will fill the earth with justice. No one may appoint himself to the role, and when men did in 1979 they brought only bloodshed to the Sacred Mosque.
The Islamic perspective
The Hour is certain, and God (﷾) alone knows its time. Its signs come from Him and are not ours to arrange. Muslims are told to prepare themselves and to do good until the end.
The knowledge of the Hour is with God (﷾) alone.
The Prophet (ﷺ) named ten great signs, among them the False Messiah and the descent of Jesus.
A man who asked when the Hour would come was asked what he had prepared for it.
If the Hour comes while you hold a young plant and you can plant it, plant it.