A Break in History
The stage of life before death is both the first and the final chance for every person to prove oneself deserving of Paradise. But, people spend this time accumulating worldly comforts and luxuries for themselves, to eventually live in a state of eternal deprivation after death.
One of the rules of government service is that if a government servant remains absent without his leave having been approved, the government has the right to make his case that of a break in service. A break in service means his seniority will be affected. He will lose all the rights and benefits of service, and will return to the state where he was on the day one of his appointment. Despite all his past years of service he will forfeit all his rights to promotion. Thus, a break in service means a reduction in his employment status.
This principle applies to all men and women, only on a larger scale. This second general principle may be called a break in history. If anyone who has made a history of his deeds, finds all of a sudden that that history has been erased, it will be as if he has returned to a state of having no history.
In this world everyone stands on the history he has created out for himself. One is born here, then he gradually grows up. He receives different kinds of opportunities, by availing of which he makes a history of his own in terms of home, property, family, circle of friends, popularity, power, wealth, treasures, etc. These are all the supports that sustain him throughout his life.
He thus has a history of his own; it becomes his identity. He knows himself through it. This happens with every man and woman. Everyone carves out his history by striving unceasingly. And he stands on it.
But no one is given the opportunity to live for long with his history. Within a period of a hundred years the moment called death suddenly arrives. Death comes to everyone. It is irrevocable. And all of a sudden, he is separated from the stage of life before death and he is taken to the stage of life after death.
The arrival of death may be called a break in history. This event in history affects every man and every woman. By expending all their energy, all men and women make a world of their hopes and desires.
Every man lives in a world of his own making. Then all of a sudden death comes and he is compelled to leave this world and reach a world for which he had made no preparation. He leaves the world of his own making behind and the world in front of him is an eternal desert for which he had made no preparation. One who lived with the feeling of possessing everything suddenly enters a stage of total deprivation.
The stage of life before death is both the first and the final chance for every man and every woman. Subsequently, he is not going to be given another chance. One who has used this chance only to provide worldly comforts and luxuries for oneself will be compelled to live in the stage of the life after death in a state of total deprivation. For death will separate him from his past history and he will have no opportunity to make a new history for himself after death. One should avail of this one chance to prove oneself deserving of eternal Paradise in the Hereafter.
How strange it is that man is losing the only chance he has today and how horrible it will be when man is in a total state of deprivation tomorrow and it will not be possible for him to save himself from it!
