Boredom: A sign of weakness in faith

In the Name of Allah, the Most Compassionate, the Most Merciful.

All praise is due to Allah, the one who conceals.

("...And of mankind is he who purchases Lahw Al-Hadith to mislead (men) from the path of Allah without knowledge, (Quran 31:6) ) Qatadah said: "By Allah, he may not spend money on it, but his purchasing it means he likes it, and the more misguided he is, the more he likes it and the more he prefers falsehood to the truth and harmful things over beneficial things.'' It was said that what is meant by the words (ibn Kathir)

People have explained the downfall of believers in many ways, but the above verse puts it into context for us. This generation is the generation of entertainment. If there is no entertainment, there is no crowd. Even Masjid try to find something entertaining for people to do to attract them.

Some entertain by sitting outside the masjid, and some entertained by food, and some entertained by sports, and some entertained by smart phones. Everywhere you turn, there are ways to entertain yourself. People travel to entertain themselves, and they call it vacation. Vacationing from what? Regular prayer in the Masjid. Peaceful life at home. Meeting the relatives.

In reality, everyone is bore if not entertained. Now, it is not prohibited to entertain oneself, and the Prophet (PBUH) did participate in activities of entertainment. What is happening is that we are wasting hours of our lives that we could have spent in remembering Allah. I do not point fingers at anyone, as I am guilty of it myself. I wasted 3 hours last night watching something that was idle talk at the end. Nothing material or spiritual I gained. Why did I do? I was bored. Does this sounds familiar? Next generation gets bore even faster. My kids are bore, if we ask them to shut off electronics. It is amazing how we are attached  to filling our void with idle activities.

Personally, I see this as a sign of weakness in faith. When I read Quran, or read a book of knowledge, I get a boost, and want to continue this everyday, because probably my faith is high. After a while, I find myself involve in an activity that was created to pass time. Pass time?!? Time will pass regardless of what we doing. We should not be wasting our precious time in idle stuff.

Most of us find it boring to listen to an hour lecture on Aqeedah or Fiqh, but zip through an hour long episode of a TV series. We are not connected to Allah in a way that we find sweetness in his remembrance. Yes, when the time comes for adhan, we will fold our chairs unwillingly and drag our feet to pray salah, but as soon as salah is finish, we stand up and start mingling without spending anytime in dhikr or tasbeeh.

I think if we control how much time we spent on idle activities, and try to spend more time in reading books, listening to lecture, going to classes, or just discussing Islam at our dinner table, we can start increasing our faith. Once our faith increases, all other issues in the community will melt away.

Also, most of the successful people, believer and non-believer, do not watch TV or Movies. They either read books or busy with something important.

Enough is Enough! I pledge to work on defeating this boredom in my life and cut down on idle activities I am drawn to, and suggest you do the same. And Allah knows best.


Abu Huraira reported Allah's Messenger (may peace be upon him) as saying: Allah, the Exalted and Glorious, said: The son of Adam displeases Me by abusing Dahr (time), whereas I am Dahr--I alternate the night and the day. (Sahih Muslim Book 027, Number 5581)


JazakAllah Khairin

A struggling believer
AbuArman Jumani