Having been born in Pakistan, the earthquake has rocked me to the core. Perhaps I have PTSD (post-traumatic stress disorder), for I relive the grief of the thousands who lost loved ones. I remember how after my father’s death I would awaken every morning and momentarily feel fine; and then the sleep haze would clear and I would damn myself for not having died in the night.

Incredulous at the extent of the earthquake’s destruction in Pakistan, I battled my grief as well as the distressing questions that resurfaced. Time for professional help, I thought and went to Imam Dr. Muneer Fareed of the Islamic Association of Greater Detroit, who is also professor of Islamic studies at Wayne State University. “Avoid the punishment argument,” he suggested. “Only God knows definitively whether an affliction is a punishment, a test or a virtue in the guise of a calamity.”

People in self-reflection mode started to say that Pakistanis had become very materialistic. Was God’s hand drumming sense into us all?

Dr. Fareed explained: “I prefer the test argument. All of life is a test, including the calamities that befall us. Pakistan is certainly being tested individually and collectively. A nation established in the name of religion has a far greater responsibility than a nation established to preserve ethnicity or nationality. All of the teachings of Islam that speak to humanitarian values apply with greater poignancy to a nation like Pakistan. In addition to the materialism argument, which may well be true, Pakistan needs to reexamine its moral compass, its raison d’etre, for now more than ever, it is being asked to compromise its principles in the national interest or worse still, in the interest of global mavericks bent on molding the world in their own image.”

The Monday after the earthquake in Pakistan, almost every other patient I saw spoke confidently of all these rapidly occurring natural disasters being a sign of the end of times. Seemed a logical enough question to me so I asked the expert again. Dr. Fareed exudes an enviable equanimity. “When the Prophet [may God bless him and give him peace] died, people predicted that those were end times; when the ‘Ali-Mu‘awiyya conflict occurred they did the same, and so on. Global end times are irrelevant when compared to the end time of the individual, which is death. We will all probably be dead, and taken to task in the after life long before the physical world ends. Our own salvation is tied, not to global qayamat (reckoning), but to our own individual qayamat.”

The concept of individual accountability is enshrined in Islam. No parents, sons or saints will be bailing us out then. Imams, shuyukh and leaders of Muslim countries are however doubly burdened on the Day of Judgment: they shall have an individual cognizance, and also remain answerable for the sins of the congregants or citizenry that they misguided.

It is tempting to attribute the earthquake in Turkey to their bold disobedience and quickly couple it as cause and effect. The Qur’an exhorts us to reflect, but to speculate about God’s intentions is an exercise in futility and sickening self-righteousness. No one has a conduit with the Divine to be able to confidently proclaim that this calamity is a test and that one the wrath of God.

And when the despair and depression lift, fortunate are those who are able to feel the closeness to God. Even more blessed are those who are able to see that they were tested with wealth and family just so they could climb the rungs of spiritual ascent. After all, in Sura Anfal and Taghabun (8:28, 64:15) the Qur’an says “know that your possessions and progeny are but a trial.”

Islam is a deeds-based religion and it behooves us to be in a state of dynamic self-evaluation. An inventory of the day’s events and what we racked up, good and bad is a great way to keep the record clean. Like ‘Umar bin Khattab said: “do your own hisab (accounting) before your hisab is done for you.”

And when misfortune strikes, may we be in a state of serene submission; accepting that we

have lost worldly loves and possessions only to gain closeness to the Creator.

Mahjabeen Islam is a freelance columnist and physician practicing in Toledo,Ohio.