Examples of Some Prayers and Supplications

 

A SUPPLICATION

O God! You are my Lord; I am a slave.

You are the Creator; I am the one created.

You are the Provider; I am the one provided.

You are the Owner; I am the one owned.

You are the Mighty and Glorious; I am the one abased and wretched.

Your are the Absolutely Rich One; I am the one absolutely poor.

You are the All-Living; I am the one dead,

You are the All-Permanent; I am the one mortal.

You are the All-Munificent; I am the one miserly.

You are the All-Benevolent; I am the one doing ill.

You are the All-Forgiving; I am the one sinful.

You are the Grand One; I am the one despicable.

You are the All-Strong; I am the one weak.

You are the Giver; I am the one begging.

You are the One Giving Security; I am the one in fear.

You are the All-Generous; I am the one in utmost need.

You are the One Answering pleas; I am the one pleading.

You are the All-Healing One; I am the one sick.

So forgive me my sins and spare me and heal my ills, O God! O All-Sufficing One! O Lord! O Faithful One! O Most Compassionate One! O Healer! O Munificent One! O Restorer to Health! Pardon all my sins, and restore me to health from all illnesses, and be pleased with me for all eternity! Through Your Mercy, O Most Merciful of the Merciful!

 

SUPPLICATION

A beloved who disappears by declining or setting is not beautiful, for one that is doomed to decline cannot be truly beautiful. It is not—it should not be—loved in the heart for the heart is created for eternal love and is the mirror of the Eternally-Besought-of-All.

A desired one who is doomed to disappear below the horizon is not worthy of the heart’s attachment or the mind’s preoccupation. It cannot be the object of desires, and is not worthy of being regretted after. So why should the heart adore such a one and be attached to it?

I neither seek nor desire anything mortal. For I am myself mortal, and I do not desire one who is mortal. What have I do with any such?

A worshipped one buried in decay—I do not invoke such a one, nor seek refuge with it. For I am infinitely needy and impotent. One that is itself powerless can offer no cure for my endless pains, nor can it solve my infinitely deep wounds. How can one who cannot save himself from decay be an object of worship?

The mind that is obsessed with appearances wails despairingly on seeing the decay of the things it adores in this universe of upheavals, while the spirit, which seeks an eternal beloved, also wails, saying: ‘I love not the things that set.’

I do not want, I do not desire, separation, and I cannot endure it.

Meetings followed immediately by separation are not worth troubling about; they are not worthy of being longed for especially. For just as the disappearance of pleasures is pain, imagining it is pain also. The works of the lovers, that is, the works of poetry on metaphorical love—love for the opposite sex—are all lamentations caused by the pain arising from imagining this disappearance. If you were to condense the spirit of all the works of such poetry, from each would flow this lament.

It is because of the pain and tribulations coming from those meetings doomed to end and those painful metaphorical loves, that my heart cries out and, like Abraham, says: ‘I love not the things that set!’

If you desire permanence in this transient world, permanence is born out of transience. Annihilate yourself with regard to your evil-commanding soul, so that you may gain permanence.

Free yourself of bad morals, which are the basis of worldly adoration, and realize self-annihilation. Sacrifice the goods and property that are in your disposal in the way of the True Beloved. See the end of beings, which marks extinction. The way leading from this world to permanence passes through self-annihilation.

The human mind, which is absorbed in causality, laments despairingly in bewilderment over the upheavals caused by the decay of the world. The conscience, which desires true existence, like Abraham, wails, ‘I love not the things that set.’ It severs the connection with metaphorical beloveds and decaying beings, and is attached to the Truly Existent One, the Eternal Beloved.

O my mean soul! Know that the world and all beings are certainly mortal, but you may find a way leading to the Permanent Being in each mortal thing, and may discern two gleams, two mysteries, of the manifestations of the Undying Beloved’s Grace, on condition that you succeed in sacrificing your mortal being.

In each bounty the act of bestowing is discerned and the favor of the Most Merciful perceived. If you succeed in discerning the act of bestowing through the thing bestowed, you will find the Bestower. Also, each work of the Eternally-Besought-of-All points out the All-Majestic Maker’s Names like a missive. If you succeed in understanding the meaning through the inscription, you will find by means of the Names the One called by those Names. Since you can find out the kernel, the essence, of these transient things, obtain it. You can throw away without pity their meaningless shells, their outer coverings, into the flood of mortality.

Indeed, in the universe there is not a single thing which is not a word of embodied meaning and does not show many of the All-Majestic Maker’s Names. Since beings are words, words of Divine Power, understand their meanings and place them in your heart. Fearlessly cast the letters left without meaning into the wind of transience. After they are gone, do not concern and occupy yourself with them any more.

The worldly mind, which is preoccupied in appearances and whose capital consists of only the knowledge of the material world, cries out despairingly in bewilderment and frustration, as its chains of thought finally end in nothingness and non-existence. It seeks a true way leading to truth. Since the heart has withdrawn from those that set and are mortal, since the heart has abandoned the deceiving beloveds, and since the conscience has turned away from transitory beings, you too, my wretched soul, seek help in ‘I love not the things that set,’ and be saved.

 

A prayer for the Qur’an

O God, make the Qur’an our companion in the world and our confident in the grave; our intercessor in the Hereafter and our light on the Bridge of Sirat; a veil and protection against Hellfire, a friend in Paradise, and a guide and a leader to all goodness. O God, illumine our hearts and graves with the light of faith and the Qur’an, and brighten the evidence of the Qur’an for the sake of him whom You sent down the Qur’an, upon him and his family be peace and blessings from the Compassionate and Solicitous One. Amen.

 

This article has been adapted from Risale- i Nur Collection.