The people of the world are those who prefer the world above everything else. It is told in “Qisas-i…

The people of the world are those who prefer the world above everything else. It is told in “Qisas-i Rabghuzi” that before Adam, peace be upon him, was sent down to earth, Allah created the souls of human beings, sent them to the face of the earth — to the life of this world — and commanded them to return. People set foot into the life of this world, and at the appointed time some of them returned to the presence of God. Some remained in the world. Then God sent them to Paradise and commanded them to take a look and return. One group of people remained in Paradise, and some came back once again to the Court of Glory. The author says that those who remained on the face of the earth were the people of the world who loved the world — the unbelievers. Those who remained in Paradise were the people of Paradise — the believers. Those who returned to the presence of God were the friends of God, His saints, His chosen servants, that is, the lovers of God. God asked them, “Why did you not stay in Paradise?” They said, “O our God, You are dearer to us than both this world and Paradise. Your pleasure and Your beauty are enough for us.” Then God returned everyone's souls to the world of command, and after that the subsequent events took place: Adam, peace be upon him, came down to earth with our mother Eve, peace be upon her. Then, in turn, the souls began to make their way to the bodies set apart for them... We will end the story here. The rest can be read in the book. What we want to talk about is the people of the world. Knowing the people of the world has at least two benefits: are we ourselves not becoming people of the world? The second benefit is that, recognizing them through this knowledge, we gain the chance to flee from the people of the world. The state of the people of the world is as follows: — they love the rich and the propertied, like themselves; — they measure people's worth by their means, respecting those with much money more and those with little money less; — when their worldly goods increase, they rejoice; when they decrease, they fall into grief; — they envy people with a lot of money and make plans to act as their enemies; — they never have the patience for conversations about knowledge and wisdom, enlightenment and spirituality; — they think nothing of scholars and people of knowledge; there is absolutely no love in their hearts for people of learning, and they do not feel the slightest awe before them; — when they see the mistakes of people of knowledge, they insult them; — to increase their money, they do not shrink from baseness and the forbidden; — they blame the destitute and the poor and look down on them; — they consider wealth and money the sign of every achievement, measure success by the amount of money, and believe that they attained this “success” by their own strength, intelligence, planning and resourcefulness; — the humility of the people of the world is false, and they can never rise to the summit of true lowliness before God; — if their wealth is taken away, they fight hard to get it back, and if they cannot get it back, that is, if their minds cannot find a way to recover it, they soon die; — they make their small acts of charity look great, and they remind others of their favors; — they perform their worship for people's eyes, and with their false prayer they try to mock those who truly worship; — if someone harms their property, they become furious; — most importantly, they spend all their strength on enjoying every kind of pleasure as much as possible and on dazzling everyone with their wealth; — they bow only to wealth and physical power, and for this reason it is very easy to subdue them, buy them, and use them as slaves. Although many people seem to be concerned with the nation and religion, in reality they are concerned with money, fame and position. They never accept the truth; they gather with those like themselves and leave others outside the door. It is better not to hate them; it is wiser not to waste attention on them. Only, so as not to become like them, it is commendable for a person to work on his own character and befriend the people of spiritual states, the people of Allah and the people of love. Everyone will be resurrected together with those he loves.

Akrom MALIK