This
letter, written to his brother Shaikh Mawdûd, reminds that the world is
short-lived and that it might end in eternal torment:
My brother’s
cherished letter has arrived here. It has made us happy. My brother! May Allâhu ta’âlâ bless us and you with successes!Life in
this world is very short. Endless torments are its
pays. Shame on a
person who spends this sojourn obtaining useless, fruitless things, thus ending
up in unending pains!
My brother! People from far and near are leaving
aside their worldly advantages and swarming towards us like ants and locusts.
And you are willingly diving into the despicable profits of this world,
disignoring the value of the honour of being from the same family. You are
struggling to attain those profits. The saying, “Shame
is a part from îmân, ” is a hadîth-i-sherîf.
My brother! This gathering of men of Allah, this
coming together for the sake of Allah, which falls to our lot in the city of
Serhend (is such a great blessing that), you would not even find another
blessing a hundred times less blessed if you travelled all over the world.
Nowhere else could you attain the profits that you would gain here. You have
missed the blessing for nothing. Like children, you have bartered precious
jewels for pieces of glass or walnuts. A Persian line rendered in English:
Shame,
thousands of shame!
My brother!This fortune is hardly come by another
time. The fortune may exist, yet such meetings will not take place. How will
you find and obtain this blessing then? Where will you find something you have
missed? With what will you compensate for the losses? You are making a mistake.
You are pursuing a misunderstanding. Do not lose your heart to sweet, fatty
morsels!Do not fall for sequined, lurid raiments!Such indulgences will bring
repentance and lamentation in the end, both in the world and in the Hereafter.
Getting oneself into troubles or risking the endless torments of the Hereafter
for the sake of pleasing one’s friends and acquaintances is not something that
a wise person would do. May Allâhu
ta’âlâ bless you with a sound reasoning
and awaken you from that slumber!
My brother! The world is notorious for its
unfaithfulness.Everybody knows about the abject and niggardly ways of those who
are indulgent towards the world. Shame on the person who squanders his valuable
lifetime on such a worthless mendacity! What devolves on a messenger is only to
deliver the message. Was-salâm.
The
sugarcane avowed to be hollow, and was sugared;
The poplar rose high, to be hewn down for firewood.