Dunyā

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Ad-Dunyā ( Arabic الدنيا' DMG ad-dunyā  ' the nearer, lower ') in Islam denotes the world of human experience and creation, this world . In the composition al-ḥayāt ad-dunyā ("the life of this world") the term already occurs in the Koran , for example in Sura 2:86 and Sura 87: 14-17 .

The concept of this world is often used in Sufi literature , where it is a symbol for the worldly as the inessential that distracts from the real and life goal, from Allah . To combat this distraction one needs to control one's lower instincts ( an-nafs al-ammara ).

The well-known mystic Rābiʿa al-ʿAdawiyya al-Qaisiyya is said to have asked: “Who will lead us to the Beloved (= Allah )?” Her servant replied: “Our beloved is always with us, but this world cuts us off from him. "

The opposite of dunya is al-achira  /الآخرة / al-āḫira , the Islamic afterlife as the place of divorce in heaven and hell. Another contrast to this world or to the human world is al-ġaib, literally the hidden, the realm of being that is inaccessible to human perception and understanding.

In Arabic and Turkish isدنيا( Dunya , Dunja or Dunia ) a common female given name meaning the world (cf. Turkish Dünya = earth, world). Well-known namesake include the TV presenter Dunja Hayali , the actress Dunja Dogmani and the Iraqi-American poet Dunya Mikhail .

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