While life is indeed a priceless blessing,
death puts an end to it, at least in this present, apparent world. How
should a believer react to the phenomenon of death, specially when a close
one has disappeared as a result? The question assumes considerable importance
when the deceased appears to have received a ‘premature call’.
No death, it should be clearly borne
in mind, is premature. The decision of the time of death of each soul is
already taken long before he is even actually born. It is all a part of
the divine scheme of the All Knowing Allah. Anybody, therefore, who dies
in his twenties, for instance, has lived the true length of his life as
much as the other who has experienced a stay stretching over a period of
a century or so. The former, as a consequence, would have ‘overstayed’
had he lived beyond his death-day; the latter would have died ‘too early’
had his departure been a few days earlier than what it actually turned
out to be. Death of an individual should not, therefore, be carried beyond
a reasonable expression of affection and sympathy for the deceased because,
after all, it is only the consummation of an event which was pre-planned
and could not have been otherwise.
The decision of the time of death,
moreover, is taken by none else except the Merciful, Benevolent Allah.
A believing reader of the Holy Qur’an cannot escape noticing the
overwhelming emphasis on these attributes of the Almighty. How can such
a Magnanimous, Deeply Loving Creator thrust upon his creatures a time of
departure from this life when some other occasion could have been more
appropriate? If that is not possible -- and indeed it is not -- then there
is only one reasonable attitude a believer can adopt when he finds an incident
actually appearing at an ‘inopportune time’: to conclude that his own intellect
is incapable of appreciating the wisdom of the Almighty’s decision. As
a matter of fact, on many occasions, enlightened by the later events, we
are able to correct our judgement about the timing of past events. The
general principle always holds good, although on some other occasions we
may not be able to catch the rationale of the Divine Wisdom. This complete
confidence in the Wisdom and Mercy in all acts of God pacifies, to a great
extent, the tragedy of death.
What behaviour does the Almighty expect
from His servants, apart from resolute patience, when death breaks the
peace of an individual’s routine life? It is quite obvious that the Merciful
Creator wants to serve an effective notice to all those who have not received
‘the call to eternity’ as yet to remember death as consciously as possible.
Man has been put into the trial of this short and uncertain life without
any prior idea of its duration. This uncertainty of its length of time
is a blessing, for it helps in keeping a true believer alert and vigilant.
The colourful attractions of the world having the obvious advantage of
being readily available, however, threaten the possibility of an individual
to prudently take up the challenge of the trial of life. Man is firmly
gripped by the clutches of this world. Death of a close one tends to remind
him of life’s uncertainty and to help him to break out from the firm trap
of the world in case he is deserving enough. However, there are, unfortunately,
very few who take this message of death seriously enough to be blessed
with its real virtue.
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