In this same section...

In this same section, the Noble Prophet (S) besides encouraging work and effort and discharging of abilities and perceiving the importance of the rights of Allah, he warns against being afflicted by pride and self-admiration. The Shortness Of Life And The Immortality Of Good And Bad Works “O Abu Dharr!

In the passing of the day and night, you have a life that is always heading towards diminution, and your works remain preserved and suddenly death arrives and in that case every person who performs good works will reap good results and every person who does a bad work will harvest regret and every farmer reaps what he sows.” One point which impels man to work and make effort and brings to appearance the incentive to be active and perform duties is attention to this point that life is in the process of being spent.

Whether we like it or not, our life gets decreased with every breath we take and we cannot manage to bring the wheel of time to a halt and seconds cannot be turned back and in the words of ‘Ali ibn Abi Talib ( ‘a ): “Every breath man takes is a step towards death.”[^2] We ought to be careful not to lose this capital freely, a capital that is always decreasing and wearing out, until death arrives and there is no running away from it, as Imam ‘Ali ( ‘a ) states: “… A person who fears death does not escape it and he who loves to stay alive forever will not live forever.”[^3] The only way of preventing the loss of life is a profitable transaction and what better transaction than that man should build his heaven by means of his life, because that is the only capital which can purchase the value of life, as Imam ‘Ali ( ‘a ) states: “Is there no free man who can leave this chewed morsel (of the world) to those who like it?

Certainly, the only price for yourselves is paradise. Therefore, do not sell yourself except for paradise.”[^4] Therefore, what losers are people who bargain their great [and] priceless asset of life with the fire of Allah’s wrath! Perhaps those who expend their lives in pursuing vanity imagine that with the passage of life, their works also vanish. What void imagination!

Even if this inebriety is a transitory and passing intoxication, and [it is] the inebriety of the Day of Resurrection which is everlasting; but still man’s works remain conserved because works have a connection with man’s soul and Allah, the Exalted.