Ta'lim : Part XIII

Hadrat Kumail Radhiyallah hu anhu (ra) says: “I was with Ali ra once on a journey, when he reached an uninhabited place; he approached a grave and said: ‘O you dwellers of the graves! O you who live amongst ruins! O you who live in the wilderness and solitude! How fare you in the other world? How has it gone with you there?’ He continued: ‘The news from our side is that all you did leave of the wealth and riches here, has long been distributed; your children are orphans; your widows have long since remarried. Now let us hear about you.’ He then turned to me: ‘O Kumail! If they could speak, they would have informed us that the best provision for the Hereafter is Taqwa.’ Tears welled out of his eyes, as he added:’O Kumail! The grave is a container of the deeds; but one realizes it only after death.”
Our good or bad actions are stored up in our graves. It is said in a Hadith that every person meets his good deeds in the grave in the person of an agreeable companion who befriends and consoles him there. But his wicked deeds assume hideous shapes emitting bad smells, which add to his misery. In another hadith it is said: “Three things accompany a person to his grave viz: his wealth (as was prevalent custom among the Arabs of the time), his relatives, and his deeds. His wealth and his relatives turn back after his burial, but his actions go in and stay with him in the grave.”
Once the Prophet Muhammad saw (peace be upon him) asked his Companions: “Do you know in what relations your relatives, your wealth, and your deeds stand to you?”
The Companions expressed their desire to know about it. He replied: “It can be likened to a person having three brothers. When he is about to die, he calls one of his brothers to him, and asks him: ‘Brother! You know what plight is mine? What help can you render me at this juncture?’ That brother replies: ‘I shall call the doctor to you, nurse you, and attend upon you. And when you are dead, I shall bathe you, enshroud you, and carry you to the grave. Then I shall pray for you after you are buried. This brother is his kith and kin. He puts the same question to the second brother, who delivers himself like this: ‘I shall remain with you as long as you are alive. No sooner you are dead than I shall betake myself to someone else.’ This brother is his worldly wealth. He then questions the last brother in the same strain, who makes response: ‘I shall not forsake you even in your grave; and I shall accompany you into that place of utter solitude. When your deeds are weighed in the balance. I shall forthwith lend my weight to the scale of your good deeds and weigh it down.’ This brother is the personification of his good deeds. Now, tell me, which of the brothers you regard to be the most useful to the person?’ The Companions replied: ‘O, Prophet of Allah! The last brother is really the most useful to him. There is no doubt about it. The other two brothers were of no avail.”