The Inevitable - Death

By Aalimah Zafirah Mohammed
Graduate of Darul Uloom Trinidad and Tobago

All praises are for Allah who has given us life, the air to sustain us and has made us from amongst the best of mankind.

Preparation! So much preparation. Everyday we prepare, either for a ceremony or a special occasion or just for our routine household activities in general. But we forget that there is an inevitable day that is coming. A day which we should be preparing for. A day we neglect to prepare for. When is that day and what time is that day is not known. It is different for each and every person, but it will definitely happen. It is a day in which a person will experience agony and pain more severe than all the agonies ever experienced in this world.

It is narrated in a Hadeeth by Shaddad ibne Aus (RA) that the agony of death is more severe than all the agonies of this world and the hereafter. It is more painful than being sawed in two, being cut into pieces with shears or being boiled in a cauldron. If the dead were to rise from the graves and tell people about the pangs of death, no man would take pleasure in this life, nor could anyone enjoy should sleep.

So much for the pangs and throes of death, besides this, a dying man must also go though the ordeal of facing the angel of death. So horrible is the appearance of Izraeel (AS) when he comes to take the souls of the sinners and the non believers, that the strongest of men cannot bear the sight. Even our dear Prophet Muhammad (SAW) used to seek refuge from the pangs of death saying:

“Oh Allah grant us relief in the throes of death.”

Then who are you and I, my respected Muslims?

Shouldn’t we too seek Allah’s mercy and help from the inevitable and most certain day?

Yes, my readers, it is the agony of death. What preparation have we made for this? Have we forgotten all about it? Allah Al Hakeem, Al Aleem says in the Holy Quraan:

“Every soul shall taste death” (3:185).”

So how can we have any doubts about it? It can overtake us at any moment. Why is it that some of us think that we can hide from death, or climb to the highest tower to escape its approach? Allah, Al Aliyu, (the Most High) says in the glorious Quraan:

“Wherever you are, death will find you, even if you are in towers built up high (4:78)

Luqman, the Wise, once advised his son saying;

“Death is an occurrence of which the exact time is not known to anyone. Be prepared then, to meet death at any time, lest it should take you unaware or unprepared.”

This advice of Luqman (AS) lives on today.

Respected Muslims let us take heed to this advice. Let us not find ourselves in the arms of death in an unprepared state. Let us strive each and every day to prepare ourselves for that inevitable day, the day that is sure to come, our last day on this earth.