﴿ يَٰٓأَيُّهَا ٱلْإِنسَٰنُ إِنَّكَ كَادِحٌ إِلَىٰ رَبِّكَ كَدْحًۭا فَمُلَٰقِيهِ ﴾

“[then,] O man - thou [that] hast, verily, been toiling towards thy Sustainer in painful toil - then shalt thou meet Him!”

O man! Verily you are toiling laboriously toward your Lord�That is, you are striving towards your Lord through your works with great effort, �and will encounter Him, by your effort; so look upon your effort: does it merit Paradise and proximity with Him, or Hellfire and alienation from Him?Once ʿUmāra b. Zādhān said, �[Abū ʿAbd Allāh] Kahmas said to me in a whisper, �O Abū Salma, I committed a sin which I have been crying over for forty years now.� I asked him, �What is that, O Abū ʿAbd Allāh?� He replied, �Once a brother of mine visited me and I bought him a grilled fish for a small coin. After he had finished eating, I got up [and went] over to the wall of my neighbour and took a piece of earth from it with which he proceeded to clean his hands. Consequently, I have been crying over that for forty years.�� His words, Exalted is He: