The life of this world is temporary and short. Allah Ta’ala did not create the life of this world to fulfill our desires. Allah Ta’ala has created the life of Akhirah for fulfilling our desires. The place where all our desires will be fulfilled is Jannah (Paradise).
The life of this world is to prepare ourselves for this Akhirah and mere fulfillment of our necessities. Once the necessities are fulfilled we have to strive hard for the Akhirah. Even these necessities should be kept to a minimum and simple life needs to be adopted to focus our efforts for the Akhirah.
Allah shows through examples in history of those people who strove hard for this dunya but eventually lost everything when they left this world or of those people who lost everything in this life even when they were alive. Here are few lessons from history to learn from.
Alexander
Alexander was proclaimed king by the Macedonian army and by the Macedonian noblemen at the age of 20 after the assassination of his father. He had to crush several rebellions and kill several people to keep his hold on Macedonia. He then expanded his empire with a series of campaigns against Persians and reached India. This campaign lasted 12 years and he was returning back after the Macedonian army revolted to go back to Macedonia. Before he reached Macedonia, on either 10 or 11 June 323 BC, Alexander died in the palace of Nebuchadnezzar II, in Babylon at the age of 32. Details of the death differ slightly – Plutarch‘s account is that roughly 14 days before his death, Alexander entertained his admiral Nearchus, and spent the night and next day drinking with Medius of Larissa. He developed a fever, which grew steadily worse, until he was unable to speak, and the common soldiers, anxious about his health, demanded and were granted the right to file past him as he silently waved at them. Two days later, Alexander was dead. Diodorus recounts that Alexander was struck down with pain after downing a large bowl of unmixed wine in honour of Hercules, and died after some agony.
With 12 years of continuous effort and building a huge empire from a series of military campaigns, Alexander was not able to enjoy all he had got. He was not able to reach his home country also. A big lesson for us to not go after this temporal worldy gains which will finish on our death.
Genghis khan
Born in 1162AD and uniting and establishing the mongol empire in 1206, Genghis khan ruled until 1227. Most of his life was spent in campaigns to expand the mongol empire. In 1227, after defeating the Tangut people, Genghis Khan died (according to The Secret History of the Mongols). The reason for his death is uncertain and speculations abound. Some historians maintain that he fell off his horse during a horseback pursuit from the land of present day Egypt due to battle wounds and physical fatigue, ultimately dying of his injuries.
His effort of 21 years, killing so many people and destroying so many things, produced the largest empire in the world at that time, but he could not enjoy it. He died at the age of 65 and when his empire was expanding, his sons were in constant internal conflict about who his heir will be.
Yazeed bin Muawiya
Yazeed, son of Muawiya, who came to power after the death of Muawiya (RA) committed a lot of oppression to hold on to power. He had Hadhrath Hussain bin Ali (RA) and 16 members of the family of Prophet (PBUH) killed at Karbala for the only reason that they did not pledge allegiance to him. Further, he sent a commander to fight and get control of Makkah from Abdullah bin Zubair (RA). In this process, even Kaabah was shelled and caught fire and ceiling of Kaabah came down. Many more atrocities are to his credit. He reigned only for 3 years 9 months. All this blood shed and destruction for less than 4 years of rule. He has lost a lot in the Akhirah in order to get the pleasure in this short life.
Shershah Suri
Shershah deposed Humayun and took control of India. He was Governor of Bihar under Babur. He was born in 1486 and became Emperor for 5 years from 1540 to 1545 and became Shaheed in the Battle of Kalinjar. He said “I became a king when the sun of my life is setting”.
Humayun
Humayun, son of Babur, who succeeded his father lost his empire to Sher Shah Suri (after ruling for 10 years 1530-1540) and wandered to the west in search of help to regain the lost empire. He got help from the shah of Persia on the condition that he become shia. In Order to get his help, he had become shia (atleast as a show). He came back to Delhi with a huge army and took it back after being on the run for 15 years. In 1555, he regained the lost empire but to live only for 339 days before returning back to Allah.
These are only few instances from the history to show that even the kings have to leave everything behind that they strove so hard for. If we keep our eyes open, Allah Ta’ala shows us many signs in the previous nations.
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1. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alexander
2. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genghis_Khan
3. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yazeed
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