The Whispered Prayers 12 – Abdur Rahman’s Corner
Peace, one and all…
In the twelfth Whispered Prayer, Imam Zayn al-Abidin (as) explores knowledge (ma’rifah)
May the hearts of the lovers be opened.
My Allah, tongues fall shorting of attaining praise of You proper to Your majesty, intellects are incapable of grasping the core of Your beauty, eyes fail before gazing upon the glories of Your face, and You have assigned to Your creatures no way to know You save incapacity to know You!
“My Allah, place us among those within the gardens of whose breasts the trees of yearning for You have taken firm root and the assemblies of whose hearts have been seized by the ardor of Your love! They seek shelter in the nests of mediation, feed upon the gardens of nearness and disclosure, drinks from the pools of love with the cup of gentle favor, and enter into the watering-places of warm affection. The covering has been lifted from their eyes, the darkness of disquiet has been dispelled from their beliefs and their innermost minds, the contention of doubt has been negated from their hearts and their secret thoughts, their breasts have expanded the verification of true knowledge, their aspirations have ascended through precedent good fortune in renunciation, their drinking is sweet from the spring of devotion to good works, their secret thoughts are delicious in the sitting place of intimacy, their minds are secure in the place of terror, their souls are serene through the return to the Lord of the worlds, their spirits have reached certitude through triumph and prosperity, their eyes have been gladdened through gazing upon their Beloved, their settling place has been settled through reaching the request and attaining the expectation, and their commerce has profited through the sale of this world for the next!
My Allah, how agreeable for hearts are the thoughts inspiring Your remembrance, how sweet traveling to You through imagination upon the roads of the unseen worlds, how pleasant the taste of Your love, how delightful the drink of Your nearness! So give us refuge from Your casting out and Your sending far, and place us among the most elect of Your knowers, the most righteous of Your servants, the most truthful of Your obeyers, the most sincere of Your worshipers! O All-mighty, O Majestic, O Generous, O Endower! By Your mercy and kindness, O Most Merciful of the merciful!
