Do not be excessive in eating...

Do not be excessive in eating, for those who are excessive in eating are excessive in sleeping, and those who are excessive in sleeping are deficient in praying, and of those who are deficient in praying, it is written that they are negligent. (12) 45. Jesus the son of Mary (‘a) stood up among the Children of Israel to preach. He said. ‘O Children of Israel!

Do not eat before you become hungry and when you become hungry, eat but do not eat your fill, because when you eat your fill your necks become thick and your sides grow fat and you forget your Lord. (13) The blessed and the wretched 46. It is reported that [Imam] Ali (a) said: Jesus the son of Mary (a) said: ”Blessed is he whose silence is contemplation (fikr).

whose glance is an admonition, whose house suffices him and who cries over his mistakes and from whose hand and tongue the people are safe.’ (14) 47. Jesus said: How can someone benefit himself while he trades himself for all that is in this world, then he abandons that which he has traded as an inheritance to others and destroys himself? But blessed is the man who purifies himself and prefers his soul to everything of this world.” (15) 48.

I heard Imam Sadiq (‘a) say: ”Christ (‘a) said to his disciples: ‘If you are not lovers and my brothers, you must accustom yourself to the enmity and hatred of the people, otherwise you will not be my brothers. I teach you this that you may learn it; I do not teach you so that you may become proud. Verily, you will not achieve that which you seek unless you give up that which you desire, and by enduring patiently that which you detest.

And guard your gaze for it plants lust in the heart, and it is sufficient to tempt one. Happy are they who see that which they desire with their eyes, but who commit no disobedience in their hearts. How far is that which is in the past, and how near is that which is to come. Woe to those who have been deluded when what they loathe approaches them, and what they love abandons them, and there comes that which they were promised. There is a lesson in the creation of these nights and days.

Woe to those whose efforts are for the sake of this world, and whose achievements are errors. How he will be disgraced before his Lord! And, do not speak much about anything other than the remembrance of God. Those who talk much about things other than God have their hearts hardened, but they do not know it.