Death Is A Dark Place

This morning, a very well-known leader for Shia Muslims died --- Sayed Mohammed Hussein Fadlallah. See, in our religion, we follow someone who is in a much higher position and much more well-versed in the religion's rules than us... and let him interpret our holy book, the Quran.... Fadlallah was known as the more liberal leader... especially when it came to women, which I believed was good, because we need someone who is more modern nowadays.

So I found out early this morning about his death (apparently he died from internal bleeding and had been sick for a while) from my friend who texted it to me when she found out. And for some reason, it was such a shock... and I'm actually feeling quite sad about it. I didn't know him personally, but I felt like he was doing something for the Muslim world, and despite allll the criticisms from the more traditional clerics, he kept going...

It also affected me deeply because I've been thinking a lot about death recently. No, I'm not suicidal... but about what happens to us AFTER we die. I know I'm not ready to die... not just because I'm young and feel like I still need to fulfill many things in life... but then again, I might just feel the same way when I'm 80... but also because I feel like I haven't done enough good things in my life...

In our religion, we believe that after we bury the body, we are tortured for our sins in our graves... scary, I know... And on the Day of Judgement, God raises our souls up and judges us for everythingggg we have done in our lives... And that is when He decides where we'll be spending the rest of our time... Hell or Heaven... Although, it is also believed that if we weren't such great sinners, we would pay for our sins in Hell, and then move up to Heaven.

But the scary thing is, once you die... there are no second chances... there is no way to turn back time and try to redo some of the stupid things we've done on Earth. Once we're dead... that's it. Our fate will be decided from there on.

I know everyone has different beliefs, and I feel that everyone's interpretation of death has truth to it... But in the end, all of our religions teach us the same thing... to be a good and moral person during our time on earth...and that we shall be rewarded or punished in some way or another for the way we lived.

But the question lies... no matter how much we do... are any of us really ready for death?