What does the Quran say about TIME MANAGEMENT?

On 2^nd of March I shared about what the Quran say about the “Creation of Time”. Today let’s chat about how we can use time wisely – or in modern management term, Time Management.

The Quran has a beautiful short chapter about the topic – chapter 103, one of my favorite chapters. I believe this is intentional - short, precise, meaningful and easy to understand and remember. To me, all the short chapters of the Quran seems to have a specific purpose: focused on important core concepts and provide a quick guide on one’s spiritual and moral well-being – like time.

Time is perhaps the only limited resource that man has. This topic is perhaps one of the most important one to reflect. Let me share about 10 entries here. All emphasis are mine to help readers focus on a particular message

All emphasis are mine to help readers focus on a particular message.

1.    CONSIDER the flight of time! Verily, man is bound to lose himself unless he be of those who attain to faith, and do good works, and enjoin upon one another the keeping to truth, and enjoin upon one another patience in adversity. - Quran 103: 1-3

2.    He it is who has made the sun a [source of] radiant light and the moon a light [reflected], and has determined for it phases so that you might know how to compute the years and to measure [time]. None of this has God created without [an inner] truth. Clearly does He spell out these messages unto people of [innate] knowledge:- Quran 10:5

3.    CONSIDER the sun and its radiant brightness, and the moon as it reflects the sun! Consider the day as it reveals the world, and the night as it veils it darkly! Consider the sky and its wondrous make, and the earth and all its expanse! Consider the human self, and how it is formed in accordance with what it is meant to be, and how it is imbued with moral failings as well as with consciousness of God! To a happy state shall indeed attain he who causes this [self] to grow in purity, and truly lost is he who buries it [in darkness].– Quran 91:1-10

4.    And spend on others out of what We have provided for you as sustenance,  ere there comes a time when death approaches any of you, and he then says, "O my Sustainer! If only Thou wouldst grant me a delay for a short while,  so that I could give in charity and be among the righteous!" - Chapter 63:10

5.    O YOU who have attained to faith! Remain conscious of God; and let every human being look to what he sends ahead for the morrow! And [once again]: Remain conscious of God, for God is fully aware of all that you do; – Quran 59:18

6.    CONSIDER the daybreak, and the ten nights! Consider the multiple and the One! Consider the night as it runs its course! Considering all this - could there be, to anyone endowed with reason, a [more] solemn evidence of the truth? – Quran 89:1-5

7.    IT IS GOD who creates you [all in a state of weak­ness, and then, after weakness, ordains strength [for you], and then, after [a period of] strength, ordains [old-age] weakness and grey hair. He creates what He wills; and He alone is all-knowing, infinite in His power. - Quran 30:54

8.    Verily, in the creation of the heavens and the earth, and in the succession of night and day, there are indeed messages for all who are endowed with insight, [and] who remember God when they stand, and when they sit, and when they lie down to sleep, and [thus] reflect on the creation of the heavens and the earth: "O our Sustainer! Thou hast not created [aught of] this without meaning and purpose. Limitless art Thou in Thy glory! Keep us safe, then, from suffering through fire!-Quran 3:190-191

9.    And We have established the night and the day as two symbols; and thereupon We have effaced the symbol of night and set up [in its place] the light giving symbol of day, so that you might seek to obtain your Sustainer's bounty and be aware of the passing years and of the reckoning [that is bound to come]. For clearly, most clearly, have We spelt out everything! – Quran 17:12

10. CONSIDER the heavens and that which comes in the night! And what could make thee conceive what it is that comes in the night? It is the star that pierces through [life's] darkness: [for] no human being has ever been left unguarded.

Obviously, time is not money, time is not gold. It is something far more meaningful, something far deeper. Let us reflect. Please do share and find out more about the management of time in the Quran.

Peace, anas