Who is “The Son of Time”?
It is endlessly captivating when words reveal themselves to you in particular, unannounced moments — like a crystal which bedazzles with its sparkle only when seen through a particular angle. The Arabic/Urdu word “Ibn al Waqt” is a poetic phrase. Like a crystal, it seems to have been formed — rather crafted — with care and precision. Common usage of such phrases erodes the finely crafted edges and so their brilliance seems to be diminished with time. But perhaps it is not really diminished; we only need to read them in the right place and at the right time to be illuminated.
Ibn al Waqt has two contrasting meanings. One meaning is that the Ibn al Waqt (The Son of Time) is he who regards the Present as all there is, without a care or thought to the Past or to the Future. In this, he leads himself to recklessness and gives in to his lower self, saying yes to every desire it puts forward — legitimate or otherwise.
He forgets an important distinction, though. It is that out of following two statements, one is true and the other is merely delusion. The truth is that at any moment, only that moment exists. The false statement is that only a given moment exists.
It is an important distinction to consider.
The second meaning of Ibn al Waqt corresponds to that true statement: at any moment, only that moment exists. To expand a little, it is to say that from our perspective, Allah Ta’ala creates the World and everything in it each moment. In this realization we, for an infinitesimally small instant, share divinity — or perhaps taste it — nay, smell it as a fragrance from a flower that is almost not too far. We share divinity in the sense of realizing time as an Eternal Now — as a single point — rather than linearity broken into fragments and held together by the imperceptible glue of “life”.
Ibn al Waqt — The Son of Time — is then he who is born anew out of every moment, capable of radically changing himself for the better (or for the worse) in an instant. This meaning has its implications. Tawbah or repentance, for example, does not seem like an impossible, radical uprooting of a human’s whole life — a process which, in our linear temporal existence, seems worthy of mockery. For how can a person change like that — in an instant?
But Ibn al Waqt can change in an instant because he is born every moment into existence — almost as if he is a newborn with limitless possibilities with regards to the kind of adult he is going to be. This is refreshingly hopeful: we can become better beings at any moment.
There is, however, a small catch. Once this realization is made, it is indeed a matter of a single moment but only once the realization is made. So, as creatures of choice, one must choose here as well. Which Ibn al Waqt are we going to be?
