Just Another Dust In The Wind

A few days ago, one of my father's relative has passed away. And about three months ago, a family member from my father's side also passed away. One by one my family member have left us behind. I'm not gonna weep here talking about mourn things, it's just that I found something to write about when I read a daily hadith from my mobile phone. Fyi, Hadith is a recorded words of our prophet Muhammad SAW which have been passed from one person to another and it reached some trusted people who have compiled and wrote it in a book.


This is the hadith that I read a moment ago :

On the authority of Abu Hurayrah (may Allah be pleased with him), who said that the Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him) said:

A man sinned greatly against himself, and when death came to him he charged his sons, saying:

When I have died, burn me, then crush me and scatter [my ashes] into the sea, for, by Allah, if my Lord takes possession of me, He will punish me in a manner in which He has punished no one [else]. So they did that to him. Then He said to the earth: Produce what you have taken-and there he was!

And He said to him: What induced you to do what you did? He said: Being afraid of You, O my Lord (or he said: Being frightened of You) and because of that He forgave him.

[Muslim]

The two family members from my father's side have been cremated, just like the hadith above told. They have different religion from me, so it's like a tradition in the family from my father's side when someone passed away the other family member will do the cremation instead of burial. I have attended three times cremation in my family, and two of them I have sent the ashes to the sea together with the family member.

Even though it is different from what my religion taught on how to treat a dead body of a human, but we have learnt that cremation is existed in this world.

Yellow Tulip and Roses for
the deceased family

We have a discussion among our family while waiting for the cremation until the dead body become ashes. We talked about on how we want to be treated once we died one day, since me and my other family member is different so this has became an interesting topic. One of my family said that he wants to be cremated if he died one day, because in his believe said that if our body is cremated then the soul will be free and will not be haunting around. The other way, if we are buried then the soul will not be free and will be haunting around since the dead body is still there.

My father's friend gave his opinion as well, he said that if he has died one day then he wants to be buried since he is a moslem. That's what a moslem taught to do to the dead body. Then my brother gave his opinion as well, he asked my family member who wants to be cremated, "can you see the soul of a dead person in any cemetery that you have ever visited? And have you ever witnessed any soul that has been cremated is free and not haunting around?" Then he answered no. Then my brother said that's why since nobody knows what happened to the soul, so no one can verified which one is the best option.

Then I have another conversation as well with my brother after we visited the mortuary room. Fyi, a mortuary room is place to keep a dead body in a coffin for two to three days so people who have any relation to the person can visit them before the dead body being cremated. Me and my brother talked about on do we have to pray for them since we have a different religion? Is it useful for us to pray for them? I never thought my brother would have a good answer. He said that it's okay for us to pray, there's nothing wrong to pray for others. We cannot judge whether our prayer is useful or useless to them, since we don't know whether Allah SWT will forgive them or not. Then I remembered a story about our prophet Muhammad SAW who prayed for his uncle who has a different religion with him. His uncle loved Muhammad SAW so much and helped him a lot during his life. Then Allah answered his prayer by decreasing the level of punishment for his uncle with the very light punishment.

So that's why during the visit my brother still pray for my other family member who has passed away even though he has a different religion. I never thought my younger brother could be wise sometimes. :D

From here I have learnt something during the cremation and scattering the ashes to the sea. I learnt that no matter how we love our family and friends so much, we have to lose them someday. There's nothing last forever, so we have to be ready to lose them. And I have learnt that no matter who we are right now, we are actually nothing but another dust in the wind. Whatever we have means nothing, so there's no point of being arrogant and proud of what we have, because in fact we own nothing, even our body not ours. We will leave this world one day to another world, so while we're still alive let us do good so Allah SWT may forgive us one day. Aamiin...