THE FINALITY OF DEATH
Every Moment Could be the Last
The Quran mentions the eventual demise of every human being in its inimitable way.
Every human being is bound to taste death. (3: 185)
It means that every human being will certainly die. Man goes about relishing the flavours of the world, but in the end, the taste destined for him is the taste of death. The taste of death is so bitter that it destroys all other flavours. This is reiterated in a Hadith: “Remember death often. It is the destroyer of all tastes.” (Kitab Al-Zuhd, Tirmizi)
The word ‘taste’ mentioned in the Hadith is used in a broader sense here. Man is a pleasure-seeking being. He savours everything that he does: eating, wearing good clothes, building a good home, travelling for pleasure, attending fun-filled meetings, occupying the seats of fame and power etc.
Man immerses himself completely in worldly delights. But if he truly realized that all these delights will suddenly be ended by death, his life would change completely
In all such things man finds immense pleasure. He immerses himself completely in these delights. But if he truly realized that all these delights will suddenly be ended by death, his life would change completely. For example, when a person finds faults in another person, he unconsciously gets the pleasure of imagining that he himself is flawless. When a person humiliates someone, it gratifies his ego. A person who unjustly seizes someone’s property and gains satisfaction from this, considers it as due to the virtue of his supposed intelligence.
A person can experience happiness and pride on performing many actions of this nature. All this may cause him to believe that as actions of a successful human being. But if he realizes that the angel of death can come at any time, and will suddenly end his life, he will feel that his death has already occurred before his actual death. This realization would destroy these false beliefs that he has about himself.