Maulana Wahiduddin Khan | The Sunday Guardian | November 15, 2015

The Prophet said: "I have never seen anything more strange than people sleeping, while they should have been running away as fast as they could from hell fire.

I have never seen anything more strange than people asleep while they should have been running as fast as possible towards heaven."

How dreadful the punishment of hell and how ignorant man is of this reality! How wonderful are the delights of heaven and how strange not to be eager to attain them.

Surely this is the strangest thing in the whole world. These people who are asleep will be awakened to the reality of life only after death.

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Today people are lost in the world, leading their lives as if there were no superior power above themselves, although every day death comes to announce that man is confronted with a reality which is beyond his control.

How helpless is man, yet how powerful he imagines himself to be. Man breaks his promises; he does not pay people their due; he does not bow to the truth; he accuses others but fails to admit his own mistakes; he turns away from the weak and hails the strong; he bases his life on his desires rather than on principles; he persecutes the downtrodden and cowers before the mighty; he concentrates on himself rather than on God.

Fear of hell and the desire for heaven do not dominate his life; he is guided by worldly apprehensions and desires alone.

Man continues in his evil ways and forgets that in doing so, he is removing himself further from paradise and drawing closer to hell. This is the tragedy of man; he does not care for that which he should most desire and does not fear that which should strike terror in his heart.