Islamic Stories: For Muslims and non-Muslims.

Learning From The Dead

Once we went to San Fransisco, a city in the USA, and offered our Dhuhr prayer in a local Masjid. Before the prayer, a dead body was brought in for a funeral.

For two months, this brother's body was staying in a morgue but nobody claimed it because they didn't know who he was. A renowned scholar was visiting this area from Palestine and he arranged for his funeral.

Before the necessary funeral prayer, the scholar was asked to give us some advice about death. After reciting some verses from the Quran and saying some ahadith of Prophet Muhammad (SAW), he mentioned an incident that took place with Uthman bin Affan (RA), who was the third Caliph of the Muslims.

He said that once Uthman (RA) stood up to give Jumah Khutba (sermon) on Friday when a dead body was brought in for the funeral. Immediately after that Uthman (RA) finished his khutba and did dua.

Later, some people approached him and asked why he finished the khutba right away. Uthman (RA) told them that the dead body is the biggest khutba. If we don't learn anything from that, then we will not learn from any other thing.