DEATH’S LESSON
For those still Alive
AFTER the death of a person the body is washed and wrapped up in a new sheet of cloth. People say the prayers that are recited on such occasions, and then, lifting the corpse on their shoulders, they head to an empty grave. They lower the body, with great respect, into the grave and cover it up with mud. When one witnesses such a scene one should ponder over the question as to “Why has Islam ordained such honourable treatment for a dead body?”
The human body is useless after death, but is accorded a respectable status and buried with full dignity. Burying it in mud is a commandment directed not at the dead body, rather its significance is for those who are still alive. Through a dead person an important lesson is conveyed to living people—that they, too, will meet the very same fate one day. In this way, the living can see themselves in the form of the dead. They can experience death before death arrives.
A man who was a living being like any of us is now dead. Just the other day, he was walking, talking, seeing, and doing so many things, but now he lies perfectly still. The value he commanded in people’s eyes has suddenly been completely wiped out. God uses this event to convey a lesson about life to others.
Through a dead person an important lesson is conveyed to living people—that they, too, will meet the very same fate one day.
When a Muslim dies, people wash and clean and clothe a corpse with great care and carry it to the grave that awaits it. And when they lower the corpse into the grave, each of them takes a handful of mud and puts it in the grave. They do this three times. While doing it the first time, they say Minha khalaqnakum (“From the earth We have created you”). When throwing in the mud the second time, they say Wa fiha nuidukum (“And We return you to it”). And the third time, they say Wa minha nukhrijukum taratan ukhra (“And from it We shall bring you forth a second time”).
This putting of mud in the grave three times is the climax of the whole event. In this way, it serves to remind us of the reality of man and of our final destination in the Heareafter.