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 The Destination of the Souls

What is the destination of the souls? When a person dies, where does his soul go?

When a person dies, his soul is transferred into another realm called “Barzakh.” Soul stays in “Barzakh” until qiyamah (the day of resurrection).

The realm of Barzakh is a transition period for the soul

Linguistically, “Barzakh” means a barrier or a partition between two things.
As an Islamic term; Barzakh is the transition and preparation period between the substantial world (dunya) and the spiritual realm (akhirah) and also altering duration in the realm of Barzakh is called so. (Sayyid Sharif Jurjani)

Just after death, soul watches his own corpse and the people around him

Ibn Jarir At-Tabari narrated from Abu Hurayrah that Our Blessed Prophet(pbuh) said,
“By He Who owns my life! The dead person hears the sound of your slippers (or shoes) when you depart and leave him…” (Ibn-i Kathir)
“Exactly the deceased recognizes the ones who wash it, carry the coffin and lay it in the grave.” (Imam Ahmed)

In the Barzakh, a heavenly soul is welcomed by the other heavenly souls

When a Believer (Mu’min) dies, his soul is welcomed by the ahl-i rahmah .(the ones who gained the mercy of Allah) Just like the welcoming of a man in the world who has brought glad tidings. The heavenly souls say: “Grant a respite to your brother till he gets rest; because he was in a deep sorrow. They ask the newcomer soul: “What has such and such man been doing? What has such and such woman done? Has such and such girl got married?” When they ask him about one and got the reply “He died before me,” they say “"İnnâ lillâhi ve innâ ileyhi râciûn. If such is the case, he must have been carried away to the hell, that is his mother.” (Ebu Ayyub) (Ihya-I Ulumuddeen)

In the realm of Barzakh, the heavenly souls move independently while the deniers dwell under the seven layers of the earth

Ibn Jarir At-Tabari narrated from Abu Hurayrah that Our Prophet (pbuh) said:
“(The believer’s) grave will be made wider for him seventy forearms length, and it will be filled with light. A door will also be opened for him to Paradise. He will be told, `Look at what Allah has prepared for you in it.' He will increase in joy and delight and then his soul will be placed with the pure souls, inside green birds eating from the trees of Paradise.” (Ibn-i Kathir)
“The soul of the believer becomes a bird of paradise feeding on the trees of paradise. He eats there till Allah (swt) gets him back to his body on the day of resurrection.” (Muvatta, Nesai, Ibn-I Mace)
The expounders, basing upon some other narrations, say that the souls becoming the birds in the paradise are the souls of the mujahids (believers that struggle or fight in the way of Allah) and the martyrs. (believers who died for Islam.)
They indicate that the souls of the other believers dwell sometimes in the heaven and sometimes in the yards of their graves. The souls of the martyrs are within the green birds and fed wherever they please. (Kutub-u Sitte)
Ebu Bakr Ibn-i Arabi narrates the consensus of the Ummah that not the other souls but only the souls of the martyrs have the blessing of eating before the resurrection day.
Imam Suyuti disclosed the destination of souls briefly as follows:
“It isn’t wrong to say that the soul of a deceased has a “dwelling place”. Because this expression indicates that the soul does not exactly dwell just in the grave or in the yard of the grave; but it indicates that the soul has connections with these places. Because the soul is able to dweell in the Rafik-i A’la although it is attached to the body at the same time.” (Kitab-ul Munjali)
“After a believer dies, his soul stays in a grade called Rafiq-i ala, still connected to the body at the same time. If someone gives salam to the body in the grave, the soul in the Rafiq-i ala will acknowledge his salam.” (Ibn-il Qayyim- Kitab-ur Ruh)
Rasulullah (pbuh) says in a hadith that:
"Whoever invokes blessings on me at my grave, I hear him, and whoever invokes blessings on me from afar, I am informed about it." (Abu al-Shaykh, Kitab al-Salat; Bayhaqi ,Hayat al-anbiya; Ibn Hajar, Fath al-Bari)
The soul of the Blessed Prophet is both in the Rafiq-i A’la and together with the other prophets and also in the dreams simultaneously. Because the soul, differing from the physical body, has such a high ability of movement and such a high speed that it ascends to the heaven in a jiffy.
As narrated in the hadith, the stiuation of a sleeping man is also a proof for the independence of the soul. “The soul of a sleeping man ascends and passes through the seven heavens; prostrates Allah (swt) before the Arsh, then gets back to its body. This trip takes a very short time for the soul.” (Suyuti, from his interpretation of Nesai) Kaynak: http://askaquestionto.us - The Destination of the Souls