Unlike Thought for the Day, writing for the World Service has the distinct advantage of pushing politics into the background. What seems so important here is so insignificant in the lives of most people in the world. The great themes remain universal, however, and Death is without doubt the ultimate universal.

Bismillahirrahmanirrahim - In the Name of God the All-Merciful, the All-Compassionate

Small creatures have been eating the plants in my garden. Some of the damage is from insects, and some is from slugs and snails, but whatever the creature that is eating the greenstuff it had better watch out because I want it dead.

Actually, I don't have to worry too much about the need to spread carnage around the flower beds, as the job is mostly done for me by creatures slightly bigger than the pests. Ladybirds eat the greenflies, hedgehogs like a tasty slug, and the birds are devouring as many juicy insects as they can find. It's a carnivorous world out there, and the lower orders of life come cheap.

But the birds themselves must remain alert if they are to avoid the attentions of my neighbours cat, and now the cats of the neighbourhood are refusing to go out at night since the wild foxes have come in from the countryside to roam through Glasgow's streets and gardens after dark. There are not many maneaters left in Scotland any more, however. We have long since eliminated the wolves from our forests, and the most dangerous animal left around here is certainly the human being. When it comes to our relationships with animals, it is almost invariably us that eats them.

The traditional way a muslim slaughters his food, involving the flow of blood, is considered inhumane by many in this part of the world. They prefer the idea of a bloodless death, like electrocution, and by the time they see the meat sliced and plastic wrapped in the supermarket, it is almost as though there was no death, no pain, and hardly a connection with the real live animal that died for their dinner. If they'd been able to ask the animal which way it would have preferred to die, however, it might well have suggested that the question should be not "which way" but "whether at all".

We also have a natural instinct to stay alive, but when death is an experience that we all have to face, why are we so afraid of it. God takes the souls from our bodies while we sleep and returns them for our wakening, except for those He wishes to keep in death, yet few of us are afraid of sleeping. "Death's agony comes in Truth, that is what you were shunning" says the Qur'an. The agony it seems is not necessarily physical. The pain perhaps comes from seeing the truth of our lives, our sins and our self-delusions.

What is our own preferred manner of dying? Surely in dignity and awareness, but death does not always give a warning. Ibn Umar used to say that we should live our lives each day as though we may not see the nightfall, and go to sleep each night as though we may not live till dawn. "Every soul shall taste of death" says the Qur'an, "and We try you with evil and good for a testing, then unto Us you shall be returned". Why should we not look forward to our deaths if that is when we receive the reward for our actions in this life, considering that the One Who judges our actions is the All-Merciful and All-Compassionate.

[Qur'an, from the chapter called Cattle, vv. 59-62]

With Him are the keys of the Unseen; none knows them but He. He knows what is in land and sea; not a leaf falls, but He knows it. Not a grain in the earth's shadows,not a thing, fresh or withered, but it is in a Book Manifest.

It is He who recalls you by night, and He knows what you work by day: then He raises you up therein, that a stated term may be determined; then unto Him shall you return, then He will tell you of what you have been doing.

He is the Omnipotent over His servants. He sends recorders over you till, when any one of you is visited by death, Our messengers take him and they neglect not.

Then they are restored to God their Protector, the True. Surely His is the judgement; He is the swiftest of reckoners.