Mu'jam Kabir Tabarani 8939 — One day Sayyiduna Abdullah bin Mas'ud

Thabit bin Qutbah al-Muzani said: One day Sayyiduna Abdullah bin Mas'ud (may Allah be pleased with him) delivered a sermon to us the like of which he had never delivered before it nor after it. He said: "O people! Fear Allah, and hold fast to obedience and the community, for these two are the rope of Allah which He has commanded. What you dislike in obedience and the community is better than what you like in division. Allah Almighty has not created anything of this world without setting for it a limit which it will reach, then it will keep decreasing until the Day of Resurrection. Behold! The handholds of Islam have been made firm, and soon they will begin to decrease and keep retreating until the Day of Resurrection. The sign of that is that you will sever your ties of kinship, and destitution will spread so much that the rich will fear nothing but poverty, the poor will find no one to show him kindness, and the beggar will stand between one Friday and the next without anything falling into his hand. While people are in this state, the earth will bellow once with a sound like the lowing of a cow, and every people will think that the sound came from their own courtyard. Then it will stop and bellow a second time, and it will throw out the pieces of its liver." He was asked: What is meant by the pieces of the earth's liver? He said: "Heaps of gold and silver like these pillars. From that day until the Day of Resurrection, gold and silver will be of no use, and no one will find anyone to accept the charity of his wealth from him."