13. HASTEN TO REPENT BEFORE DEATH STRIKES YOU
No person is aware when his moment of death (mawt) will arrive. Each person is ought to be well prepared and not be fooled with his youthfulness and health because many of the deaths occur among the younger ones, and rare to find people aging.
It is foolish for a person to have wishful thinking about living a long life as such notion is indeed from the worst of all diseases. Was it not for the thinking that one will live long; no one would have ever neglected their duties, yet such notions lead a person rushing towards sins and delaying repentance (tawbah); hastening to fulfil desires (shahawat) and forgetting to turn to Allah.
If you are unable to avoid having such mindset [to think that you may die any moment] then act as a person with such mindset; thus when the night comes, review all what you have done during the day so that if you find a sin in your record then wipe it out with repentance, and if you found a hole in your record to patch it by asking Allah’s forgiveness (istighfar). And when the morning comes, think of what you have done during the night and beware of procrastination (tasmf for it is the highest ranking soldier of Iblis.
Think of how much remorse (nadm) and regret (tafrit) a person will have when on his deathbed for all that he has overlooked and neglected, and keep in mind that life is too short, while worldly affairs are far too many.
In contrast, think of the perfect reward compared to the less reward you will receive due to your imperfection, and the reward of those who worked hard as opposed to your reward when you are lazy.
Do not keep your “self’ unwary for any moment of time for it is a rebellious horse, so do not let go the rein for you do not know when it will throw you off its back. Ensure to spare no preaching that your ‘self should hear or speech that you can keep it busy.
Otherwise, by Allah, you will be debased with your fanciful desires. You will have wasted your life in vain. Hasten therefore to save the time remaining from your life before it is ruined, wasted in your fanciful desires and sin! Indeed many resolute persons fell in the trap of desires and many intoxicated persons fell in an endless hole.
There is no power and strength except in Allah, alone.
(Source: al-Hafiz Abu’l-Faraj ibn al-jawzl [d. 597AH] “CAPTURED THOUGHTS being” a translation of his masterpiece ‘Sayd al-K hatir)
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