Before a recent funeral, a man stood up and shouted, “I will not forgive this man.” He pointed at a body that had been laid for funeral prayers in a mosque along with three others. Many people were shocked at what this man was saying and began looking at him in disbelief that there could possibly be someone that would speak ill about a dead man. The man walked toward the body mumbling to himself.
Before we try to understand the man’s story, let us talk about the evil acts committed by people in the least expected of situations. Many people do not understand why these actions take place at such moments.
For example, imagine there are people standing outside the sacred mosques in Madinah or Makkah, wearing ihram and preparing for action. These people are not out to pray, but rather to rob people of their wallets and money. After robbing them they leave people in desperate situations without their identity documents and money to return home with. Such thieves are void of emotions and cannot differentiate between good and bad. This is a fine example of people without hearts and souls who take advantage of people that come for worship during the blessed month at a very sacred place. I hope these people are caught by the police and given severe punishments in tune with their terrible crimes.
Another ghastly example is of the thieves who hide between people carrying the funeral bier to the cemetery. These thieves take advantage of people’s emotions and their sorrowful mourning to rob them of their money and cell phones.
The worst example of all is that of the man who shouted that he would not forgive a person who had just died because he owed him SR15,000. People at the mosque asked the man to forgive the deceased saying he was dead and incapable of paying his debt. The man said he had reminded the dead man about the money he owed him but the dead man continually refused to pay. At that he began invoking God to punish the dead man in his grave for leaving an outstanding debt.
People who had gathered for the funeral then dug deep into their pockets and began gathering money until they had accumulated SR15,000. After the man was paid, he said he would forgive the dead man but added that he had taken an oath not to pray at the dead man’s funeral. So he left the mosque with the SR15,000 firmly in his hand. After the funeral prayer, family members carried the other three bodies to the grave while the fourth, for which money had been gathered, remained on the ground. People assumed the man had no relatives and so the imam of the mosque went to the body and opened the sheet. To his surprise there was no body, just pillows.
That man behaved worse than the devil. He conjured up a plan that even the devil himself could possibly not think of.
