Fath al-Rabbani

Benefits: … Dear readers! By now, you must have realized the greatness of this remembrance, that it is an extremely easy act which becomes the cause of two and a half thousand good deeds daily. But whether you accept it or not, the vast majority of those who pray are unable to maintain this practice. Now, we have become such a people that we waste one and a half to two hours in a single tea gathering, for in our polluted minds, only one law regarding the House of Allah has become ingrained: that one should delay in coming to the mosque and hasten to leave from there. If, in any mosque, after the obligatory prayer, there is a collective supplication or a lesson of five or six minutes, then all the worshippers are deprived of this remembrance. After saying salam, the state of most worshippers leaving the mosque is such that if they are delayed any longer in the mosque, some calamity will befall them. As for the matter of reciting these tasbihat (words of glorification) at bedtime, the contract that Shaytan had taken up, he has succeeded in it. Generally, after the ‘Isha prayer, we remain awake in our homes for two, three, or even four hours: some are busy eating, some are engrossed in gatherings of idle talk, some are occupied with games and sports, and some are so absorbed in watching or listening to dramas, or on the internet and computer, that no one has any time left … … and so on. But when it comes time to sleep, and we lay our heads on the soft pillow, the tongue becomes heavy and mute, and the eyes begin to flutter very quickly, and ultimately, before uttering any word of Allah’s remembrance, we die a metaphorical death. These are not emotional words or a speech; this is a reality, and there is no way out except to accept it as reality. The reason for this is a lack of knowledge of Allah (ma‘rifah) and a lack of interest in religious and hereafter-related matters.