In the Name of Allah, the Beneficent, the MercifulDo you think that you will enter Paradise without any trials while you have known the examples of those, who passed away before you They were afflicted with suffering and adversity and were so violently shaken up that even the Messenger and the believers with him cried out: When will Allahs help come Then they were comforted with the words, Be aware! Allahs help is ever close. (Q2: 214). If Allah loves a people, He tests them. Whoever is pleased, for him there is pleasure, and whoever is angry upon him there is wrath. The most harshly tested people are the Prophets, followed by those who are best after them. A man is tested according to his religion. If his religion is strong his test will be more intense; if his religion is weak his test will be weak, he will be tested according to the level of his religion. Allahs servant will continually be tested until he is left to walk on the earth without a mistake- Prophet Muhammad.A VISIT to the hospital the other day reminds me of the extreme nothingness of the human contraption. It reminds me that inasmuch as the human subject experiences some freedomfreedom in the extremely humanistic-cum-American sense, it is nonetheless true that deep inside his physiognomy is a work in progress.The work actually started in the primordial period when Prophet Adam emerged from nothingness to existence. It proceeded from there to generations upon generations after him.Thus every child that is born becomes a new Adam- an agent with indescribable possibilities, a subject with uncanny capabilities to be angelic and satanic, a being whose experience of life is subtle and solemn as his experience of death. In other words, every soul, which emerges unto the world in human form, carries within it the primordial signs and templates of its subservience to the Will of its Creator. The child, which cries at birth does so not by choice, the man, who would expire today would do so in obeisance to a power beyond his control. Thus it becomes easy to understand one of the realities of life- the innate capacity of the human physiology to self-destruct, to implode. The man, who is hale and hearty yesterday would suddenly fall sick and become frail and incapable of movement today.Sickness, therefore, becomes a signifier. It reminds us of the priceless value of health. In sickness some remember their origin, their Creator. In sickness, we become acutely informed of the uselessness of earthly possessions. John Donne says, God employs several translators, some pieces are translated by age, some by sickness, some by war, some by justice. We were once told in a public lecture how it costs people suffering from kidney malfunction to undergo dialysis. Then the audience became attentive to the priceless value and blessing of Allah, which manifests itself each time we visit the toilet and empty our bowels and bladder with ease! SubhanAllah!! Todays sermon, however, derives its relevance from the socio-political and economic schisms confronting our nation and which find graphic illustrations from the persona of those who visit our public hospitals in search of succour. It appears two main categories of patients now seek health services in hospitals, the haves and the have-nots. Nigerians in the first category are those who visit our hospitals because they have too much to themselves. They are sons, daughters and families of those who have cornered our wealth and have consequently become hostage to their own greed.By appropriating the commonwealth to themselves, they indirectly subject their bodies to unceasing oppression and misuse. Since they have more than the fair share of the national resources, they are able to eat more than their bodies require and drink more than their bodies can cope with.Prophet Muhammad once said as follows, we are a nation (of believers), we do not eat unless we are hungry, and each time we eat we do not fill our stomach. His statement represents an exemplification of the Quranic injunction which reads: And eat and drink but waste not by extravagance, certainly He (Allāh) likes not Al-Musrifūn (those, who waste by extravagance) (Q7:31). Emphasising this further, the Prophet says, the son of Adam (i.e. man) fills no container worse than his stomach. It is enough to eat a few morsels of food to keep one s back straight. lf you must eat more be sure that only one-third of your stomach is filled with food, one third is left for water and the remaining one third for air. Ibn Sina, the renowned Moslem physician and philosopher, said, never have a meal until the one before it has been digested. He also advised against excessive salt and fatty meat. His list of food for dieting mostly included vegetables. Ibn Khaldun, a Moslem sociologist and historian famous for his Muqaddima, also mentioned that over-eating causes many diseases.He says, know that hunger is better for health than eating too much. Even if we cannot remain hungry, eating less is good. Eating less is better for the development of body and mind. When the Prophet was saying this, he was calling attention to what modern medicine now suspects as one of the major reasons for the incidences of chronic diseases and ailments. Overeating and drinking, medical practitioners would contend, hinder complete nets of genes in the body, causing not only obesity, but also diabetes and heart diseases. Aside from the health risks involved in over eating, the glutonous among us becomes easy prey to Shaytan. He forgets himself in the revelry of the plenitude at his disposal and ultimately forgets his Creator. The person who overeats finds it difficult to attend to his prayers, would be unable to wake up in the night to perform his spiritual devotions. He would ultimately become a guest to the physician. Our hospitals, nowadays, are however equally populated by the other patient, men and women, who have virtually nothing to feed on.These are my fellow compatriots, who live and eke their living in the backwaters of our cities, in villages and abandoned quarters of society. They live in hungry parts of our land where water and electricity are a rarity. As soon as their enfeebled and emaciated bodies fail to withstand the austere realities of their environment, they are brought to the major hospitals in the cities where, as is the case in a popular city in the South-West, the hospitals are constantly painted and re-pained even if the medical personnel have no instruments to work with.Their sight in the hospitals would remind you of Frantz Fanons The Wretched of the Earth; their sigh and groans would awaken you to Albert Memmis masterpiece, The Colonizer and the Colonized. Brethren, it feels as if we are under siege, it feels as if the coloniser is here again! Unto those, who are sick not as a result of the evils wrought by their own greed, we pray, May Allah the owner of health grant you succour and quick recovery, unto those, who are sick as a result of their greed and incontinence, we pray that Allah rescue you from the iniquitous propensities of your ways. Aamin.(guardianfridayworship@gmail.com)
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