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Lesson 68: The Largest Marketplace

Tradition

الدُّنْيا سُوْقٌ رَبِحَ فِيها قَوْمٌ وَ خَسِرَ آخَرُونَ

Imam al-Hadi (‘a) is narrated to have said: “The world is a marketplace wherein one group profits, while another group loses.”1

Brief Commentary

This world is not the real home of human beings - it is neither a final abode, nor is it a permanent home. It is in reality a grand marketplace where people invest their resources and then gain a return on what they have worked so hard for. Their resources include their intellectual, emotional, spiritual, and psychological wealth. These are the resources that we accumulate and which then lead us towards everlasting felicity and happiness in the next world.

Those who are active, hard working, and aware are cognizant of the existence of this grand marketplace and they are always busy working in order that they can ‘purchase’ valuable goods with the resources they have at hand. Their goal is to transform what they possess into ever more valuable goods which are everlasting, and they do this for the felicity of both themselves, as well as their society. This is in contradiction to those who sell their resources for goods of ever lessening value (or in some cases, things which are of a purely corrupted and destructive nature). The end result is that those who have ‘traded’ well will leave this world with a load of true wealth that will last forever, while those who have ‘traded’ improperly will leave this world with nothing in their disposal but loss and regret.

  • 1. Tuhaf al-’Uqul, p. 361.