5 Questions to be asked on Judgment Day

To create a good society the very important thing is the sense of accountability because human nature inclines towards the fitna when there is no system of accountability. Islam tells us that we are not free for our actions that whatever we want we do it without fear of question. We are accountable for our deeds and whatever we do we have to give the answer of it in the court of our creator. Those who do the good deeds will enter Jannah and those who do the bad deeds face the punishment on the Day of Judgment. There will be few critical questions a person has to answer them as one Hadees says:

عَنِ ابْنِ مَسْعُودٍ، عَنِ النَّبِيِّ صلى الله عليه وسلم قَالَ ‏ ’’‏ لاَ تَزُولُ قَدَمَا ابْنِ آدَمَ يَوْمَ الْقِيَامَةِ مِنْ عِنْدِ رَبِّهِ حَتَّى يُسْأَلَ عَنْ خَمْسٍ عَنْ عُمْرِهِ فِيمَا أَفْنَاهُ وَعَنْ شَبَابِهِ فِيمَا أَبْلاَهُ وَمَالِهِ مِنْ أَيْنَ اكْتَسَبَهُ وَفِيمَ أَنْفَقَهُ وَمَاذَا عَمِلَ فِيمَا عَلِمَ ‏‏‘‘

Ibn Mas'ud narrated that the Messenger of Allah صَلَّی اللہُ تَعَالٰی عَلَیْہِ وَاٰلِہٖ وَسَلَّمَ said: “The feet of the son of Adam shall not move from before his Lord on the Day of Judgment, until he is asked about five things: about his life and what he did with it, about his youth and what he wore it out in, about his wealth and how he earned it and spent it upon, and what he did with what he knew.

(Sunan Tirmidhi)

My dear brothers this Hadees Pak is very admonitory. We spend our life in following our desires of Nafs but this Hadees gives us a clear message that we will be asked that how we spent our life? If we spend our life in bad deeds how will we be able to answer this question? And people say ‘do whatever you want in your youth’ this mindset is totally lost because we just read the Hadees. A special question will be asked about the youth so spend your youth according to Sharia. The other questions are about our wealth. We must read this question and ponder about our situation as well. We just earn the money and don’t care that it is from the Halal means or Haram and we spend money we don’t know are we spending on Halal or Haram? We just need the wealth. We just want to become rich. We don’t care if we earn by deceiving our brothers or by bribe or by Riba (interest), or any other Haram means, and in doing so we forget about this question.

When we spend our money we sometimes spend on forbidden things, like we go to the cinema, we buy haram food; we spend our money on bad wedding customs. My dear brothers whenever we earn money it must be by Halal means and where ever we spend it must be a Halal expenditure. Both of these questions will be asked, earning and spending. Last question is about our knowledge. Do we act upon what we learn or what we know? There is another summary of Hadees. Once Beloved Prophet Muhammad صَلَّی اللہُ تَعَالٰی عَلَیْہِ وَاٰلِہٖ وَسَلَّمَ said to Hazrat Abu Darda رَضِیَ اللہُ تَعَالٰی عَنْہ that “you will be asked on the Day of Judgment, were you a scholar or ignorant? If you give answer that I was a scholar, then will be asked how much you acted upon what you knew and if you give reply that I was ignorant so it will be asked why you didn’t learn the knowledge?” So learning knowledge is also important and acting upon the knowledge is also compulsory.

May Allah عَزَّ وَجَلَّ forgive us without accountability and keep us on the straight path! Ameen