The conditions of the Predecessors with time and how to maintain it

Our righteous Predecessors were keen to spend their times and days in things which bring about benefits in the world and in the Hereafter.

Abu Al Wafa ibn `Aqil (may Allah bestow mercy on his soul) said: It is not permissible for me to waste an hour of my life: When my tongue and eyes stop reading, I keep thinking in the time of comfort while I am lying down, so I do not rise up until I have thought in everything I wrote down.

When someone came to Ibn Al Jawzy (may Allah bestow mercy on his soul) and he thought that he would waste his time, he used to engage himself in sharpening pencils and cutting papers so as not to waste his time.

Ibn Mas`ud (may Allah be pleased with him) said: "I have never regretted something but a day in which sun sets, cutting part of my lifetime without adding new to my righteous actions."

Ibn Al Qayyim (may Allah bestow mercy on his soul) said: "Wasting time is severer than death because wasting time keeping you away from Allah and the Hereafter, whereas death takes you away from the world and its people."

Al Hasan Al Basry said: "I have seen people who were the keenest to their times than you to your monies."