Blinded by Greed

I thought i should write about the so called *seven deadly sins*. I have already written about Anger and thought should write about Greed now. One of the reasons that i am writing about Greed is the way society is becoming. If you look at people you would be able to see that one of the reasons of constant impatience, anxiety, selfishness, murders etc is Greed. We become so involved in trying to quench our thirst for our desires that we forget the main reason we have been brought in this world. These days its always about material things, people have simply forgotten that relations, religion etc matter more. What would you do with a lot of money or material things if you were left alone? Is a big mansion with all the luxuries any good if you were to live alone in it? Would delicious gourmet food matter if you were sitting at the table alone? why dont we think about these things when we trample on people to fulfill our Greed. Please think about it! I will post some references from Islamic material so that the issue could be better understood.

The Holy Prophet(pbuh) has said: “Allah says, ‘The poor are my dependants, the rich my agents; if my agents will not give to my dependents their due I shall put them in Hell and I shall not care 

Greed is everlasting slavery.Nahj al-balaghah, Hikam,No. 103 

Imam Sadiq (AS), as stated in Misbahush-Shari'ah, said: "This world is like a portrait: its head is arrogance, its eye is greed, its ear is covetousness, its tongue is pretence, its hand is desire, its leg is conceit, its heart is negligence, its being is perishing and its destiny is decline. Whoever loves it, it gives him arrogance, whoever approves of it, it grants him greed, whoever demands it, it drives him to covetousness, whoever praises it, it clothes him with pretence, whoever wants it, it offers him conceit, whoever trusts it, it neglects him, whoever admires its properties, it ruins him, and whoever accumulates it and does not spend it, it turns him down to its dwelling place, the Fire"

Greed makes us a slave and takes us away from our spiritual journey. One lecturer said that even if you dont admit that you are greedy think about this:

When you have crisp new notes(money) and old notes and someone asks you for a change etc....you would always give them old notes. What is this? Is their a difference in the value of the old and new notes? If not then why this attachment to a piece of paper?

When ever you are about to give charity, why do you give old clothes? Would you be able to give some clothes you like or of the same standard as you wear?

Its exactly this attachment and greed that Islam wants us to move away from. Zakat, Khums, other ways of charity are some of the ways we can get rid of this disease. Lets all pray for Allah(swt) to remove greed from us...Ameen.


Ref: www.al-islam.org