The second Caliph, Umer ibn Khattab, often used to
express his sense of disillusionment about people he
had come to like, when, on further acquaintance
with them he discovered them to be idle. “On
learning that he does not work, he appears to me of
no value (he has debased himself in my eyes).”
Whichever way you look at idleness, there is no
gainsaying the fact that it is a great evil, causing one
to fritter away one’s best talents and leaving one
unqualified to face life.
A student who is too lazy to
study cannot ever hope to acquire knowledge, or
have his critical faculties sharpened in any way, and
his failure in examinations will leave him without
the ‘paper’ qualifications which is the ‘Open
Sesame’ to good jobs. Without the necessary
groundwork, he will find himself leading a vacant
existence, simply drifting from pillar to post. Even
people who have managed to qualify themselves
suitably cannot afford to rest on their laurels. When
the period of education is over, it is equally
necessary to be consistently hard-working. Many
make the excuse between the receipt of a degree
and entry into a profession that they are waiting for
the right job to come along. But one cannot go on
waiting forever, simply idling away one’s time.
Sometimes one inadvertently slips into idle ways
because there are no economic pressures in one’s
life. Those who inherit legacies, or have property or
investments which bring them some return are an
easy prey to idleness. But this is no existence for a
human being. Anyone who allows the poison of
idleness to creep into his system might as well be
dead.
Either one must opt for a regular job, which brings
one a suitable income and keeps one mentally
healthy, so that one never becomes a financial or
emotional burden on anyone else, or, if one is
financially independent, one should turn one’s
attention to higher things, pursue noble ends, serve
worthy causes and keep oneself fruitfully occupied
day in and day out. A person with no sense of
commitment is only living on the fringes of
existence. He is out of touch with reality and will
soon lapse into utter degeneracy. No really superior
being has ever been found among the ranks of the
idle.
As the old saying goes, the Devil finds work for idle
hands.
--Maulana Wahiduddin Khan
( Ref - The Moral Vision)
