A Warning and a Sermon

The day our bodies are hidden beneath the earth, and all we have done is laid bare one by one, Lord, by your grace forgive your servant on that moment when he sets out for the other world. Poor human being: even if he were granted a thousand years of reprieve from death and lived in triumph, In the end, when his turn to leave arrives, he departs from here with a hundred thousand regrets. How bitter that hour when our precious body falls onto the bed of humiliation and grows helpless. They tell our friends of our condition, and every moment someone comes by to visit the sick. And whoever is tender and kind toward us rushes to this doctor and that, searching for a cure. But when the physician casts his eye on our face and considers our state, he grows uneasy. He says, ask for such and such a remedy, it will help you; yet all our hope in it turns to loss. Perhaps only a day or two of our life remains, and those one or two days are spent weighing gain and loss. Friends and companions all fret over the outcome: what will become of things, and how will it all end? Until the moment the face changes from its usual look, and our rosy color turns as pale as saffron, And that suffering marks the body so deeply that, from thinness, it becomes like a single thread. The ship of existence falls into the whirlpool of ruin, stripped of action, left without a sail. The angels come and go at the taking of the soul, and when we look, our eyes rain blood. May it be that, in tasting that poisoned cup, the sweetness of faith is on our tongue at the end. Lord, grant us help so that in that hour the words of our tongue match the truth of our heart. Keep our faith safe from Satan's plunder, so that our soul is secure from the torment of your wrath. In short, soul and body part from each other: the bird leaves the cage and returns to its nest. If the soul is foul, it sinks into the ground; if it is pure, it rises above the sky. A cry breaks out in the house that the master is dead, and from high notes to low, the home fills with wailing and grief. On one side a servant weeps aloud, and on another a maid breaks into lament. Like an orphan mourning a single priceless pearl, from tears the dark eyes fill with rare red gems. They bring the coffin, the cotton, the shroud, and the washer of the dead; the chants of mourners rise from edge to edge. They carry the corpse to the lip of the grave, and everyone, after the prayer, heads back home again. Each goes off about his own affairs, while our body lies imprisoned and forlorn in that pit of earth. Then Munkar and Nakir question us about our state, and all these rulings come as a trial. If we have done good, kept prayer, and resisted our own desires, that dark pit becomes a rose garden for us. But if our work was sin, wrongdoing, and vice, fire falls into the grave and it fills with smoke. For a week or two, more or less, morning and evening, a loved one keeps company with us in weeping. A few trays of halva on Thursday nights, out of show, are sent to the house of every grave reciter. And that dear wife who waited out her mourning term now wishes to be bound in marriage to someone else. The shortsighted heir comes searching for the inheritance, and then the quarreling begins over the garden and the shop. A name is left of us, while all our parts lie hidden beneath the earth with sorrow and regret. And then, when a few years have passed in this state, even that name is lost and leaves no trace. That delicate face turns entirely to earth, and that strong body becomes a handful of bones. From the soil of our tomb they bake bricks, and that clay and brick pass costly through the potter's hands. The turning of the ages moves on far past us: at times spring comes, and at times autumn. Until the day of resurrection, when for all the kinds of creatures the bodies rejoin their souls for the reckoning. The command of God, mighty and glorious, over all creation runs completely, group by group. Of every word said and heard, of every evil deed, at the place of accounting each is laid bare one by one. The scales of justice are set up for the people: one pan rises light, the other sinks heavy. Each looks upon his own good and evil, and there one turns grieved, another glad. They set the bridge of Sirat over hell; whoever crosses it comes to dwell in paradise. And whoever's foot trembles on the bridge falls into disgrace and everlasting torment forever. The wicked are taken in by the heat of hell, while God's grace becomes a canopy over the good. Many a face like the moon turns black with shame, and many a stature straight as an arrow bends like a bow with terror. Many a destitute person, through the height of his worth, finds the highest paradise as his festive dwelling. Many a poor old man, in the garden of his desire, catches the scent of paradise and becomes young again. But the wretched slave of ego and desire, in that place, is joined to a hundred thousand sorrows and disgrace. The bounty God spreads out for the obedient: how could a sinner be fit for a place at that table? Happy the heart that, in the safe and joyful sanctuary, becomes a guest at God's table of grace and generosity. This is a matter of fortune; no one knows for certain, Saadi, how your standing in paradise and eternity will be.