When the Green Finally Turns to Straw

There comes a time when people are so busy chasing something that they forget to ask: after achieving it, what is it all for? A lifetime is spent accumulating wealth, beautifying appearances, expanding influence, and ensuring one does not fall behind others. Yet, before one desire can truly settle the heart, the next one arrives demanding to be fulfilled.

The Qur’an does not forbid people from working, possessing wealth, loving family, or enjoying lawful blessings. However, the Qur’an reminds that all of these can turn into a veil if the world is no longer placed as a path, but is made the final destination. In Surah Al-Hadid verse 20, God illustrates the world as a field of plants that was once green and enchanting, then turns yellow, dries up, and finally crumbles.

“Know that the life of this world is but play, diversion, adornment, boasting among you, and competition in increase of wealth and children. Its example is like rain whose resulting plant growth pleases the farmers; then it dries and you see it turned yellow; then it becomes debris. And in the Hereafter is severe punishment, but also forgiveness from God and His pleasure. And the life of this world is nothing but the enjoyment of delusion.” (QS Al-Hadid [57]: 20).

This verse appears in a series of calls for humanity not to be enslaved by a fleeting life. After depicting a world that quickly passes, the following verse calls on people to race towards God’s forgiveness and paradise. This arrangement is important: the Qur’an does not stop at a warning about mortality, but immediately points to where human energy, time, and aspirations should be directed.

Ibn Katsir explained that through this verse, God shows the insignificance of worldly life compared to the hereafter. The world is described as play, diversion, adornment, mutual boasting, and competition in increasing wealth and children. That is the picture of the world when it dominates the heart and becomes the centre of all ambitions. Play occupies a person for a time but produces nothing lasting. Jesting and diversion turn the heart away from more important matters. Adornment captivates the eye, but its beauty does not endure. Mutual boasting makes a person measure their self-worth through the eyes of others. Meanwhile, the race to multiply wealth and children can drive someone to feel superior simply because they have more than those around them.

Ibn Katsir connects this part with Surah Ali Imran verse 14, which explains that love for various pleasures, family, wealth, vehicles, livestock, and farmland has been made beautiful for mankind. Yet, all of this is merely the enjoyment of worldly life, whereas the best place to return is with God. Thus, the problem does not lie in the existence of wealth, family, work, or position. The problem arises when these things become the absolute measure of honour, diverting people from obedience, or making them feel as if this world is the only life.