12 – Chapter on Encouraging an Increase in Good Deeds toward the End of One’s Life

Allah the Exalted says: “Did We not give you a lifespan long enough for anyone who would take heed to take heed, and the warner came to you?” (Fatir 35:37).

Ibn ʿAbbas and the leading commentators explained the verse to mean: “Did We not grant you many years—an entire lifetime?” The hadith that will be cited later, God willing, supports this understanding. Others said it means eighteen years. Yet others, among them al-Hasan, al-Kalbi, and Masruq—and this too is reported from Ibn ʿAbbas—said it means forty years. They also transmitted that the people of Madinah, whenever one of them reached forty, would devote himself exclusively to worship. Another view is that the verse refers simply to reaching puberty.

Concerning the phrase “and the warner came to you,” Ibn ʿAbbas and the majority said: it is the Prophet ﷺ. Some, including ʿIkrimah and Ibn ʿUyaynah, said the warner is the appearance of grey hair. Allah knows best.

Explanation

The author—may Allah have mercy on him—entitles this: “Chapter on encouraging an increase in good deeds toward the end of one’s life.” Realize that everything turns on one’s final state, as the Prophet ﷺ said: “A man may perform the deeds of the people of Paradise until there remains between him and it only the distance of a forearm, then the decree overtakes him and he performs the deeds of the people of Hell and enters it; and a man may perform the deeds of the people of Hell until there remains between him and it only the distance of a forearm, then the decree overtakes him and he performs the deeds of the people of Paradise and enters it.”

For this reason one of the transmitted supplications is: “O Allah, make the best part of my life its last and the best of my deeds their conclusions.” It is authentically reported from the Prophet—peace