FRIDAY DISCOURSE BY DR. ALIYU TILDEDiscourse 293
Death and Us
“Say, the Death from which you flee
will certainly overtake you…” (62:8)
Or as Alhaji Danmaraya Jos said in one of
his famous composition, Duniya Ba Ki San Gwani Ba: “Yau da
gobe karyar Allah, komai gudunmu ta kamo mu (Time is the hunting dog
of God. No matter how fast we run it will catch up with us).”
The nation will receive with shock the
death of its President, Alhaji Umaru Musa Yar’adua. Death, for the
second time, has visited Aso Rock. At dawn, cameras will focus on the
departure of his body from the villa as it they did to that of Abacha
twelve years ago. I will not be there in Katsina for the burial. I,
along with millions other Nigerians, pray for the eternal rest of his
soul. This is not the time to write about the next president or who will
be his deputy. The whole world loses its taste and glamour and becomes
nothing in the face of death. In this situation, I was compelled by
grief to revisit my reflections on, death, the most obvious thing
awaiting us, with the hope that it would, even for a moment, serve as a
wake up call.
We often forget about death as we daily
become engrossed in our everyday affairs until it catches us unawares.
When we are hit by it, all of a sudden, we cease to be what we were. We
would wear a different look. The happy becomes sad; the moving stops;
and the standing sits. The heads become lowered either as a sign of
rejecting the world that meets our gaze when it is raised or in an
attempt to hide the tears that attest to the true position of our
defeated psyche. The bold becomes weak. He bites his tongue or lips as a
calculated measure to maintain his strength. However, he is in contact
with a force far beyond his capacity; a hand that is far beyond his
reach has touched him. Whatever is his reaction, he has to yield and
accept the fact that his loved one has left this world and he will never
return.
Death is the most shocking news we can
have. Al-Motanabbi was right, metaphorically, when in a eulogy for
Muhammad ibn Ishaq al-Tanukhi he compared the shock of his family with
that of Moses, when the latter witnessed the Sinai shatter before his
eyes.
Different deaths teach us different
lessons. I think, apart from the shock, there are a number of things
that death helps us to clarify or at least remind us of. It exposes the
weakness of our mind once in contact with forces far more astounding
than we can imagine. We become helpless and pitiful. Even the most
powerful may feel the desire of the eyes to shed their tears.
Another lesson is that death reminds us
that we are just soil. Nothing else. God said: “From the Earth We
created you, to it We will return you, and out of it We will bring you
out another time.” Here, I often remember the much-quoted verse of
the greatest woman mystic in Islamic History, Rabi’at’ul Adawiyyah. She
once said: “If I would gain Thy Love, every (other) thing would be easy.
Certainly, whatever is above the soil is (simply) soil.”
The soul is what makes the difference. It
has the capacity to attain unimaginable heights once it is able to
transcend the mundane over which the ordinary clamor. That is why she
preceded the above verse with another one, saying, “I wish (what is)
between You and me is eternal, and whatever is between the world and me
is ruin…”
Yes, that is the best achievement.
This Love that binds a servant to His Lord was the experience of another
mystic. He said: “We drank, upon the mention of the Loved, a wine. We
were intoxicated with it before the creation of karmu. They said
to me, ‘Describe it (the wine), for you know it well’. Yes, I have
knowledge of its features: Purity without water, gentleness without
passion, light without fire and soul without body.”
Death also reminds us of our ultimate
destiny. As I looked around our family graveyard I remember all those it
has consumed. I then recalled the verses Shumaf bin khalif al ‘abdi that
I recently came across in al-Hamasat’ul Basariyyah. He said: “My
ancestors have tasted death, they have gone, and I see myself, after
their departure, as meeting with it. No soul is given a respite even if
it wishes to live, once her Caller has come.”
Yes. ‘al-Abdi was right. “But no
soul will God grant a respite when the time appointed (for it) has
come...” (63:11). Death will be tasted by every one of us. In three
different places, this assurance was repeated as divine decrees, as the
late Egyptian clergy, Abdulhamid Kishk constantly put it. He observed
that the decrees were framed in a language that precludes exemption:
“Every soul will taste death…” (3:185 and
Death also offers us the opportunity to
reach the deepest level of reflection our intellect could dig reach. It
is an irony that with this reflection starts the return journey of our
strength. It leads us to one point i.e. the conclusion that death is
part of life. After all, there is still a chance of re-union in the
Hereafter, which will, in sha-Allah, separate us from death
forever. “Nor will they there taste death, except the first Death...”
(44: 56). At this point, the mind will finally settle and accept
everything as the best, given that it was the Hand of God at work.
The famous poet al-Motanabbi, the master
of metaphors once said: “Whoever does not die by the sword will die by
something else, the cause may differ, but Death is one.” In another
place the poet said, “We cry about this world (while) there was no group
the world has gathered without them separating. Where are the tyrant
Kaisers of early history, they piled treasures and none of them
remained…?”
Here at home, ourlate father and Sheikh,
Malam Aliyu Namangi was asking similar questions in his famous
Infiraji, He said:
“Yau ina Sarkin Musulmi, Bello ko
Abdulsalami, Musa ko AbdulKarimi? Sun wuce wannan Makami, Ba a san daya
wanda zai rage ba. Ummarun Dallaji Korau, Ya mace a Kumasi Sallau, Ya
mace har dansa Kwasau, ba su Dalhatu yau a Zazzau, su Abashe ina Aliyu
Babba? Sun wuce sai ambatonsu, sai tunanin arzikinsu, kyan adonsu da
kyan hawansu, ba ka kara ganin dayansu, in ba zuriyar da sun
Again we return to the eulogy of al-Tanukhi
where al-Motanabbi said: “I really know, just like any intelligent
person, that life, even if desired, is a deception. I did not expect,
before your burial in the ground that the stars sets in the ground. I
did not hope, before your funeral procession, that I would see (the
mountain of) Radwa carried in the hands of men. They brought him out,
and with everyone behind him was the shock of Moses (on) the day the
Mountain was shattered. The Sun was sick in the heart of the sky, and
the earth was shaking, almost tearing...” In a second composition for
the family he said: “Endure, the sons of Ishaq, in honor to him;
certainly the great endures on the (loss) of a great one.”
.A deeper reflection would go to the first
two verses of Surat’ul Mulk. “Blessed be He in Whose hands is
Dominion; and He over all things hath power; He who created Death and
Life, that He may try which of you is best in deed; and he is the
Exalted in Might, Oft-Forgiving.”(67:1-2)
The word “blessed” above is mentioned in a
place where God asserted His Dominion, His power, His creation of the
heavens and the earth but which, unlike in Surat’ul Furqan, were
preceded with the mention of death and life – not life and death, as we
would like to say. Why did He end the second verse with “Oft-forgiving”?
Does it mean that death is a blessing? Is death a precursor or a
pre-requisite of life? Does beginning with it imply that death is a
greater blessing than life, greater than even the heavens and the earth?
The answers would come, as fast as did the
questions, from various parts of the Quran. Yes. It is a blessing that
in God’s hands lie all powers. If it were in the hands of any mortal who
is characterized by shortcomings like vengeance or limited lifespan,
humanity and all other creations would have perished. Hence, He chose to
conclude the first verse, as He traditionally does in all verses of the
Quran relating to His Dominion, with
“He over all things hath power.”
Yes. Death precedes life because anything
living was created from nothing. And since it will cease to be, then its
existence is only transitory. Also, life, obviously, is less certain
than death. No one knows whether he will survive the next minute.
However, he is sure that death will overtake him, sooner or later.
Finally, death is a blessing wherever life exists. Without death, life
will suffocate, even for microbes. We thank God for creating it and
apportioning it among us. It is a relief, we always hope.
The verse that mentioned trial and good
deeds as reasons for death and life was concluded with the proclamation
of His Might and Forgiveness. With His Might, we are conquered by death
and become vulnerable to His Will. With it also we are assured that the
Judge has overcome every need or fear that bedevils our mortal judges,
compelling them to perpetrate injustice. Finally, His forgiving
attribute was mentioned to assure us that he will overlook whatever
wrong or mistake we might have committed as a result of our inherent
fallibility. The perspectives are just too many to exhaust.
The funeral prayer is undoubtedly
powerful. Before the dead is buried, the grief appears endless. But as
soon as the body is returned to the earth and buried in soil, relief
suddenly begins to takeover from where the grief stopped.
As for the dead, it is the beginning of a
very long journey. As we turn away, leaving him alone, the dead could
hear two voices. One, that of God who said, “Oh son of Adam! They have
brought you and left, and in the soil they buried you. Had they remained
with you, they would have been of no benefit to you. None is left for
you except Me. And I am the Living that does not die.” The second is
ours. We pray that God grants the dead eternal rest, give us the ability
to endure the loss and to take over the responsibility he left behind!
Then comes the source of real worry:
accounting for the sins and wrongs that we committed here on earth.
Certainly, the late Alhaji Mamman Shata was right in Domin Sayyadina
Tijjani when he said, “Ni dai abin da ke ban tsoro, ni dai abin
da ke ruda ni…. ba irin saduwarmu da Allah gobe, don ko yar gaskiyarmu
kadan ce Shata (Nothing shakes me like the meeting with God in the
hereafter because our good deeds are few)”.
Yar’adua has gone. We who remain would not
stay long after, as Shata again said in his eulogy of Garkuwan Gombe:
“Kowa yam mutu bai sauri ba, mu da muke nan ba mu dade ba…(Whoever
dies is not in haste, we who remain will not tarry for long.)”
We pray that God in his abundant Mercy
will forgive our sins – which, by the way, are plenty – and overlook our
inequities. Otherwise, if we were to be taken on account of our deeds,
failure would be certain. But happily, His Mercy is greater than our
sins. An ancient poet once said: “My provision is little; I do not see
it as sufficient. Would I cry over the (insufficient) provision or over
the length of my journey? Would You burn me in Hell, Oh the epitome of
ambition? Then where is my hope in You, where is my love?”
As the day breaks in just an hour,
Nigerians will be covered by sympathy for their past President. We had
wished that he remained with us to realize his seven point agenda and
other presidential stuff. Before now, we have waited for his recovery
and quarreled over his illness. Now, everything is over. “Allah mai
maganin wahala, mutuwa mai maganin gaba.” We hope those whom he hurt during his life will be large-hearted enough to forgive him. They should better apply their mind to the future before the “hunting dog of God” catches up with them too. We extend our condolence to his family and the nation at large. May God grant Umaru mercy, overlook his shortcomings, forgive his sins and reward his good deeds and intentions generously. Amin.
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