When it's 2:18 a.m. Restlessness bothered my mind. The dream realm moves away from the embrace of the night. It's not night, it's not morning. People say this is a third of the night or early morning. They say this is the best time to chat with God.
The thin hand on the wall clock moves every second, marking the time that has just passed. Suddenly it occurred to me
"Is the second, minute, hour, day, month, year, and so on time?"
Isn't everything that is summarized in the calendar and wall clock immanent? Man-made? Meanwhile, at that time, it was transcendent, God's creation.
Time is universal, but calendars are partial. The proof is the Gregorian calendar, Hijriyah, Javanese, Chinese, and so on. Especially in ancient times, maybe every civilization had a different way of interpreting time.
On Earth alone there are several differences in interpreting time. Especially if we look at time from a physics perspective. Time is relative. One second on Earth is not the same as one second on Jupiter. Time is not separated from space, depending on how strong the force of gravity is. Oh, get off the hook. Distance.
Instead of understanding transcendent time, my people have built mythology about time in a calendar. There are bad days, good days, and so on. Moreover, some determine the good day of marriage based on the date of birth. It's a bit occult.
Modern society taunts believers of the mythology as old, rick, and outdated. Behind that, modern society creates its bad days and good days. They think Monday is a bad day because it's the first day of the week to get back to work. Monday is a day that modern people hate.
As for what is expected is the weekend. Until there is the term Thanks God, it's Friday! as a marker of the arrival of good days, Saturday and Sunday. Because on that day most modern people are off and free from work. Sayyidina Ali bin Abi Talib quipped, "my recreation is work."
The culture of weekend holidays is a consequence of the pleasure that is postponed when humans are no longer in control of time because of the capitalist machine. Therefore, they are willing to exchange the money they have earned with their hard work and sweat during the weekday for momentary and pseudo pleasures at the weekend.
Work routines become very boring because they only carry out capitalistic activities (without value and meaning) to earn wages and survive. Work is not considered an inner calling to play a role in God play.
To make matters worse, a vacation, which is a form of contemplation and recreation, is reduced to being purely recreational. Contemplation refreshes the mind and recreation refreshes the body. No wonder those who take a vacation to the beach are only busy immortalizing their bodies (themselves with white sand) without feeling the slightest bit small in front of the majesty of God's creation. It's no secret that during the holiday season, natural attractions are full of trash.
Referring to Martin Heidegger (German philosopher), the starting point of the problem is the failure of (modern) humans to live their existential existence which then traps them in an ocean of banality. Modern society understands time in Benjamin Franklin sense: "time is money".
In the end, all activities (including work and vacation) are only oriented towards survival activities. Seeking reward and seeking existence. They forget to live their existential existence. So, still referring to Heidegger, to avoid the banality of time, every human being should continue to be aware of authentic-time. What is authentic is a person who lives his attachment to the world and time, but is not immersed in it.
The awareness of authentic-time makes humans appreciate every passing second. This award arises because of the deep meaning of time. There is a term in the Islamic world that is quite well known: "It is enough that death is advice." For me, this teaches me to live with time, so that not a second of time passes without meaning.
This is what is starting to fade in modern society. In the past, housewives could complete all kinds of activities such as sweeping, washing (dishes and clothes), cooking, taking care of many children, and so on smoothly without complete facilities. Compared to modern mothers who are equipped with various facilities such as washing machines, microwaves, vacuum cleaners, rice cookers, and household assistants, they are often overwhelmed with household maintenance.
No wonder God reminds His servants with a rebuke "For the sake of time, man is in the loss."
Therefore, Imam Syafi'i said: "If people pay close attention to this letter (Al-'Ashr), this letter will surely suffice them."
