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NAHJUL
BALAGHA
A Sermon of Imam Ali ibni Abi Talib (a)
I warn you of the world for it is the abode of the unsteady. It is
not a house for foraging. It has decorated itself with deception and
deceives with its decoration. It is a house which is low before Alláh.
So He has mixed its lawful with its unlawful, its good with its evil,
its life with its death, and its sweetness with its bitterness. Alláh
has not kept it clear for His lovers, nor
has He been niggardly with it towards His foes. Its good is sparing. Its
evil is ready at hand. Its collection would dwindle away. Its authority
would be snatched away. Its habitation would face desolation. What is
the good in a house which falls down like fallen construction or in an
age which expires as the provision exhausts, or in time which passes
like walking?
Include whatever Alláh has made obligatory on you in your demands. Ask
from Him fulfillment of what He has asked you to do. Make your ears hear
the call of death before you are called by death. Surely the hearts of
the abstemious weep in this world even though they may (apparently)
laugh, and their grief increases even though they may appear happy.
Their hatred for themselves is much even though they may be envied for
the subsistence they are allowed. Remembrance of death has disappeared
from your hearts while false hopes are present in
you. So this world has mastered you more than the next world, and the
immediate end (of this world) has removed you away from the remote one
(of the next life). You are brethren in the religion of Alláh. Dirty
natures and bad conscience have separated you. Consequently you do not
bear burdens of each other nor advise each other, nor spend on each
other, nor love each other.
What is your condition? You feel satisfied with what little you have
secured from this world while much of the next world of which you have
been deprived does not grieve you. The little of this world which you
lose pains you so much so that it becomes apparent in your faces, and in
the lack of your endurance over whatever is taken away from you; as
though this world is your permanent abode, and as though its wealth
would stay with you for good. Nothing prevents
anyone among you to disclose to his comrade the shortcomings he is
afraid of, except the fear that the comrade would also disclose to him
similar defects.
You have decided together on leaving the next world and loving this
world. Your religion has become just licking with the tongue. It is like
the work of one who has finished his job and secured satisfaction of his
master.
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