In the last piece, we talked about the importance of making good use of our time. That many learners fail in their learning endeavours due to time wasting. In this piece one of the instances of time wasting will be mentioned, others will be mentioned in the successive pieces Inshaa Allaah.
Paying Visits
People hide under the guise of visiting others to waste their precious time.
Yes, Islam encourages us to visit one another but not to the detriment of our wellbeing or the wellbeing of others.
Our visits to friends, family relations, neighbours, etc, ought to be well-defined.
Visits bereft of benefits are useless. Avoiding initiating such visits is from the recommended acts if not obligatory.
We should therefore limit our mutual visitations. If we must have them they must be for good purposes eg.sharing of knowledge, advices, ideas, etc.
Many of us have volumes of books on our shelves but we seldom establish friendship with them. Some books are getting ripped off by the termites and cockroaches because their owners have deserted them and opted for useless human friendship.
Our books ought to be our best friends.
Ibn Qayyim - rahimahullaah - said in Al-Fawaaid that meeting friends can be grouped into two:
One, meeting then to while away the time and have a nice time. This, no doubt, deadens the hearts and wastes the time.
Two, meeting them to attain means of safety and offer of mutual advice on truth and patience. This, no doubt, is highly beneficial.
Yet this second one despite its inherent benefits has three demerits:
- The likelihood of being pretentious to one another.
- The likelihood of getting engrossed in excessive talks.
- The likelihood of losing the purpose of the visit.
Above all, we need to limit these mutual visits.
Aboo Hurairah - radiyallaahu an'hu - narrated that the Messenger of Allaah (sallallAahu alayhi wa sallam) said:
زÙرْ غÙبًّا تَزْدَدْ ØÙبًّا
"Pay visits rarely you will increase in being loved." (Saheeh al-Jaami: 3568)
May Allaah grant us the good understanding of His Deen.
