Islam means “submission to the Will of God.” In its moral sagacity Islam signifies “striving after the ideal”. A Muslim is one who submits to the will of God. “Islam” and “Muslim” derive from the same word as the Arabic for “PEACE”. The traditional Muslim greeting is “Peace be unto you”. Islam recommends hope for salvation to the righteous and God-fearing of all religions. Muslims believe in the Divine Revelation of all prophets including Abraham, Moses, Jesus, and Muhammad. The Quran is God’s Word and Final Revelation to Prophet Muhammad revealed over a period of twenty-three years. The Muslims has certain obligations towards Allah, himself and society. They involve knowledge, work and acts of worship. Their proper expulsion demands that each of them be allocated its due amount of time. No duty should intrude on the time allocated to other duties; otherwise, there may not be adequate time to fulfill any of them. Islamic teaches for the appropriate management and investment of time, and so does contemporary administrative thought. Time is widely portrayed as gold. In reality, it is more precious than gold, for it is inestimable. Time characterizes an exceedingly important resource in life, if it is not efficiently utilized, so much will be lost. Time gone will be intricate to make up for; once it passes, it never comes back. It is not easy to give a perfect description of time but, by reflecting on the evolution of life and historical events, certain characteristics can be identified. Since long, scientists have observed that time passes at a fixed and invariable speed and every second, every minute and every hour is similar to all other seconds, minutes and hours. Time passes in a straight forward movement in accordance with an inimitably controlled system, which cannot be changed, stopped, increased or re-constructed. In consequence, the constant forward movement of time is neither fast nor slow, and it cannot be accumulated, altered, cancelled, replaced or stopped. The Holy Quran stresses the worth of time in a multiple ways and contexts, in relation, to deeds and their means, to administration and organization, to the universe and creation, and to God-man relationship with view to faith and worship.
Allah says in Holy Quran, “and He it is Who hath appointed night and day in succession, for him who desireth to remember, or desireth thankfulness”. (Al-Furqan – 62).
At another place Allah says, “… Worship at fixed hours hath been enjoined on the believers”. (An-Nisa’ – 103).
Furthermore, in Surra Ar-Rum Almighty Allah declares, “So glory be to Allah when ye enter the night and when ye enter the morning. Unto Him be praise in the heavens and the earth – and at the sun’s decline and in the noonday”. (Ar-Rum –17, 18).
One of the famous Hadith calling for grabbing the opportunity for investing time is the one narrated by Ibn-Abbas; the Prophet said, “Grab five things before five others: your youth before your decrepitude, your health before your illness, your wealth before your poverty, your leisure before your work, and your life before your death”.
Islam encourages Muslims to care for time, to exploit it and not to misuse it. Moreover, it embraces them accountable for their time. An essential obligation for Muslim’s life is to be cautious about time, to devote it sensibly and to benefit from it. In this regard, Ibn-Al-Qayyim says, “The highest, most creditable and most valuable of reflection is what is intended for Allah and the Hereafter. There are various forms of reflection intended for Allah. One of them is reflecting on time duty and function and focusing entirely on it, for the knowledgeable one is the breed of his time. If he wastes it, all his interests are wasted, for all interests arise from time. If he wastes his time, he can never regain it”. Also, Imam Shafi’i said, “Out of my company with Sufis, I benefited only two things, one of which is their saying: like a sword, time will cut you if you do not cut it…” In other words, if you do not spend time doing something useful, you are the loser by wasting it. It is exceptionally crucial for Muslims to be careful about time, the Muslims are required to consume and spend their time in what benefits them in this world and the Hereafter. In this regard, he can follow the good example set by the Righteous Salaf (predecessor). They were so cautious that in less than a century they were competent to make drastic changes in the societies into which they introduced Islam. The honorable Salaf made sure that no time passed without doing something useful, such as acquiring useful knowledge, doing good deeds, helping others and serving or advising nation (Ummah).
Calling on Muslims to utilize their time, to benefit from it and not to waste it, the Prophet said, “On the Day of Resurrection the feet of the son of Adam will not move away till he is questioned about four matters: how he spent his lifetime, how he spent his youth; from where he acquired his wealth and how he spent it, and what he did with his knowledge.
(The News Tribe / 22 July 2013)
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