BB00351: Da’irat’il-Hirz

In the Name of God, the Exalted, the Mighty

Praise be to Him Who created all things according to the form of His love and made known to all His sovereign signs, that none might be veiled from the countenance of their Beloved, nor anything be distant from the station of nearness to its Goal. Glorified and exalted is He! His essential camphor-like nature is too great to be known through description or majesty, and His essential cypress-like being is too holy to be described through manifestations of power before the appearance of all things and after their concealment. There is no God but He, the King, the Manifest, the Resplendent, the Sovereign, the Powerful, the Subduer, Who has ordained the measures of all things under the shadow of His command, and made the essences of all things between the Kaf and the Nun through the revolution of the Vav by the appearance of the Ha’ in the degree of concealment.

This is the handiwork of God whereby He creates what He creates and originates whatever He originates. He has ever been unknown through His creation and indescribable through His servants. He brings forth what He wishes through His Will without any prior origination, and does what He desires through His Purpose without any previous mention in His kingdom. For glorified is He! At every instant He is engaged in a wondrous creation. Before all things He has sent forth a sign of His oneness and a manifestation from the countenance of His eternality to all things, that all might know what God, glorified be He, has intended for His creation. His Messenger has conveyed this and those who were witnesses after him have testified to it, and those who came after them act according to their command.

Furthermore, whosoever God enables to act according to what has been written and to comprehend what has been revealed, let him act as commanded. That is, he should keep with him for nineteen complete days, without separation, the circle whose pillars have been described and whose signs have been perfected, beginning from the night of the fifth of the first ten days of each month and ending on the twenty-fourth day of that month. After the obligatory prayers he should recite these seven Names—Living, One, Self-Subsisting, Almighty, Creator, Luminous, Subduer—nineteen times. When he has finished reciting these seven invocations, let him recite this prayer. Before he completes his practice, God will set right what he desires through His grace and fulfill it through His favor. Verily He is the Powerful, the All-Sufficient, the Guardian, Whom nothing in the heavens or earth can frustrate, nor can any matter in the kingdom of creation prove too great for Him. His command is but to say to a thing “Be!” and it is.

This is the prayer:

In the Name of God, the Exalted, the Great! O Lord! I beseech Thee by every Name which is Thine in Thy knowledge, that Thou send blessings upon Muhammad and the family of Muhammad and those whom Thou hast created from the overflowing light of the family of Muhammad. Grant me, through the sovereignty of Thy singleness and bestow upon me, through the dominion of Thy eternality, mercy from Thy presence regarding what Thou knowest of my inner state and witnessest of my outer condition. For none besides Thee knows what is desired, and none other than Thee has power to fulfill my request save Thee alone.

Therefore I beseech Thee by the light of Thy exalted and sublime countenance and the splendor of Thy exalted and mighty presence, that Thou say to what I have desired in the path of Thy love, “Be!” and it is. Indeed God has said to all who ask, “Be!” and it is. That is God’s command, nearer than all things. To Him belongs whatsoever is in the heavens and on earth. He does what He wishes by His command, and He truly has power over all things. He bestows favor upon whom He wishes without desert and grants bounty to whom He desires from His presence without any path of certitude. This is from God’s grace upon all things. He is possessed of mighty grace. Glorified be God, Lord of the heavens and earth, Lord of all the worlds! Indeed peace from God be upon His sincere servants. Praise be to God, Lord of the worlds.

Answer to the question of Shaykh Nasir al-Din al-Karbala’i, year 1264.