The Sermon of The Pious (part 6)

16. It is a beneficial transaction that Allah made easy for them.

Our entire life is a transaction. Every action in this world receives a reaction. The God-Fearing exchange their mundane pleasure with the Hereafter pleasures. This transaction is for an immense profit. It is universal revenue. The Hereafter pleasures have priority to the mundane ones which the pious have ignored. It is obvious that achieving these profitable transactions depends on the divine attention.

17. The world aimed at them but they did not aim at it.

The world and its attractiveness such as power, wealth, lust, eminence, and etc. have aimed these people, but the God-fearing have no desire towards them. The desire of the pious is not the world and its attractions.

18. It captured them but they got themselves freed from it by ransom.

The world wants to enthrall and enwrap them but they don’t become bound to it. The pious have given ransom with their lives and become free from the world. This means whoever leaves the world with its pleasures and joys, and obeys God, will free him/herself from his/her past actions.

19-27- During night they are erect on their feet reading portions of Qur’an and reciting it haltingly, creating through it grief for themselves and seeking by it the cure for their ailments. If they come across a verse creating eagerness (for Paradise) they ban it covetingly and their spirits turn towards it eagerly, and they feel as if it is in front of them. And when they come across a verse which contains fear (of Hell) they bend the ears of their hearts towards it and feel as though the sound of Hell and its cries are reaching their ears.

The night of the God-Fearing has a special serenity, that’s why it is a good time for solacing the soul. Allah has settled a special mercy in night. Night has a special order and discipline; it is the best time for reciting Qur’an with an organized continuous program. Reciting Qur’an haltingly will cause change; this should be done in a beautiful way.

The cure of the pious ailments is in reading Qur’an, reading Qur’an will treat the agony of ignorance, negligence, idleness, and etc. By intoning Qur’an, the God- Fearing will gain knowledge. Every part of their body will feel these verses by reading the verses that promise chastisement, they feel the Hell by their insight. They can also see and feel the mercy of Allah by reading verses of Qur’an. Prostration and genuflection in the prayer means we neither see ourselves nor others, we only see God. This worshipping and praying is done at the best time. The pious cure their critical features by reciting Qur’an and gain honorable and acceptable features, that is why by reciting Qur’an, they adjacent their hearts with grief and provoke their fear towards the divine chastisement.

28-29- They bend themselves by their back, prostrate themselves by their foreheads, their palms, their knees and their toes.

These two phrases explain the quality and how the pious prostrate and genuflect. This is how they show their submissiveness and piety. The pious put away their conceitedness and arrogance by doing so.

30-29- During the day they are enduring, learned, virtuous and God- fearing

The pious have four features during the day:

a) They have patience which is the first necessity in social behavior. The major skill in life is tolerance. Night increases tolerance, the power of acceptance of others.

b) They are learned, knowledge is the main cause for success and it is knowledge that made human to be prostrated by the angles.

c) They have virtue and this causes them to be righteous.

d) They are God -fearing and this fear is for future and their deeds, quickly.

To be continued...

^{* Fahimeh Mahdavi}