The Close of the Part: The Ink All the Answers Are Written In

One thing is left that runs through the four items and through the fifth with them, and is not an item of its own on the paper: intention. The invigilator in the hall you see can do no more than watch the hand as it writes, and he has no way through to what lies behind the hand; so two papers with the same handwriting and the same lines are equal in his eyes, even though what moved the first man to write was not what moved the second. In the greater hall the ink the paper was written in is part of the marking — indeed it is the first thing looked at: “Deeds are judged by the intentions behind them, and every person will have only what he intended.” (meaning; Sahih al-Bukhari 1 — Umar ibn al-Khattab, sound (sahih) — al-Bukhari)

This is not to make light of the work, nor a call to stop writing. It is a statement that what is looked at is not the outward shape and not the weight of the bag: “God does not look at your outward forms or your wealth; He looks at your hearts and your deeds.” (meaning; Sahih Muslim 2564 — Abu Hurayra, sound (sahih) — Muslim)

Then comes the marking. In the hall you see it is a red pen in the hand of a man who tires and hurries, so that a correct word goes past him and he does not see it, or he stops at a small mistake and makes it larger than it is. In the greater hall it is a scale of another kind, on which what is too small to be mentioned on any human scale shows up, its good and its evil alike in showing: “And whoso doeth good an atom's weight will see it then, And whoso doeth ill an atom's weight will see it then.” (Az-Zalzala 99:7–8, Pickthall)

So when you gather the paper up in your hand, this is what you find:

• The item of your life: not how much of it, but what it was spent on.
• The item of your knowledge: not what you got hold of, but what it left behind.
• The item of your money: its way in and its way out together.
• The item of your body: the tool, and what it was worn out in.
• And a fifth item from another source: trusts and rights, and giving them back to the people they belong to.

And one step is left that everyone who has sat an examination knows, the step that separates the man who is ready from the man who is not: going over the paper before handing it in. That you come back to your paper while you are still inside the time, and read what you wrote with the marker's eye and not the writer's, and put to every item its own question: this life — where did it go? This knowledge — what did I do with it? This money — where did it come in from and where did it go out to? This body — what did I wear it out in? These trusts — did I give them back, or are they still in my hand? And this is the counsel reported from Umar ibn al-Khattab — a Companion's words, not the Prophet's: “Call yourselves to account before you are called to account; and make ready for the great presentation. The reckoning on the Day of Rising will be light only for the one who called himself to account in this world.” (meaning; Sunan al-Tirmidhi — Umar ibn al-Khattab, a report stopping at a Companion (mawquf) — not a saying of the Prophet — al-Tirmidhi)