The dead goat and the Boxing Day sales

I woke up to this tiny pretty flower that had blossomed sitting in my room. Its delicate look made me smile and I thought how beautiful it really is and how we are surrounded by eye catching things. A few minutes later when I checked my phone, there were updates after update about the big Boxing Day sale. A sale, where thousand of people look for bargains for things they sometimes need and don’t need. But in any case, they like and feel like just ‘having’. Once again it’s about being surrounded by what we like and view as important. It carries a big or small worth, but it does carry some worth.

Only last night, I came across a hadith I’ve never read before. In this hadith our beloved Prophet (saw) sums up what worth this whole dunya is to Allah. And it’s scary to know that the material things we give so much value to means absolutely nothing to Allah. How attached our hearts are to this dunya? How upset we sometimes get when we can’t have something. This hadith inshaAllah can serve as a reminder in those times we feel too attached to this meaningless dunya.

Jabir b. Abdullah said: “The Prophet (saw) passed the market on his way in from a high part of the city and the people were on both sides of him. He passed a dead goat with both ears cut off and reached out and took its ear. Then he said, ‘Who would like to buy this for a dirham?’ The people said, ‘Why would we want to when it is worthless? What would we do with it?’ He (saw) said, ‘Would you like to have it?’ They said, ‘No.’ He (saw) said that to them three times and they said, ‘No, by Allah! If it were alive, it would have a defect as it has no ear. Why would we want it as dead?’

The Prophet (saw) said, ‘By Allah, this world is less in the sight of Allah than this dead goat is to you.'”

(Bukhari, Al- Adab Al-Mufrad)