1- Praise belongs to God who guided us to His praise and placed us among the people of praise, that we might be among the thankful for His beneficence and that He might recompense us for that with the recompense of the good-doers!
2- And praise belongs to God who showed favour to us through His religion, singled us out for His creed, and directed us onto the roads of His beneficence, in order that through His kindness we might travel upon them to His good pleasure, a praise which He will accept from us and through which He will be pleased with us!
3 And praise belongs to God who appointed among those roads His month, the month of Ramadan, the month of fasting, the month of submission, the month of purity, the month of putting to test, the month of standing in prayer, in which the Qur'an was sent down as guidance to the people, and as clear signs of the Guidance and the Separator!1
4- He clarified its excellence over other months by the many sacred things and well-known excellencies which He placed therein, for He made unlawful in it what He declared lawful in others to magnify it, He prohibited foods and drinks in it to honour it, and He appointed for it a clear time which He (majestic and mighty is He) allows not to be set forward and accepts not to be placed behind.
Then He made one of its nights surpass the nights of a thousand months and named it the Night of Decree; in it the angels and the Spirit descend by the leave of their Lord upon every command, a peace2 constant in blessings until the rising of the dawn upon whomsoever He will of His servants according to the decision He has made firm.
5- Then He made one of its nights surpass the nights of a thousand months and named it the Night of Decree; in it the angels and the Spirit descend by the leave of their Lord upon every command, a peace2 constant in blessings until the rising of the dawn upon whomsoever He will of His servants according to the decision He has made firm.
6- O God, bless Muhammad and his Household, inspire us with knowledge of its excellence, veneration of its inviolability, and caution against what Thou hast forbidden within it, and help us to fast in it by our restraining our limbs from acts of disobedience toward Thee and our employing them in that which pleases Thee, so that we lend not our ears to idle talk and hurry not with our eyes to diversion,
7- we stretch not our hands toward the forbidden and stride not with our feet toward the prohibited, our bellies hold only what Thou hast made lawful and our tongues speak only what Thou hast exemplified, we undertake nothing but what brings close to Thy reward and pursue nothing but what protects from Thy punishment! Then rid all of that from the false show of the false showers and the fame seeking of the fame seekers, lest we associate therein anything with Thee or seek therein any object of desire but Thee!
8 O God, bless Muhammad and his Household, in it make us attend to the appointed moments of the five prayers within the bounds Thou hast set, the obligations Thou hast decreed, the duties Thou hast assigned, and the times Thou hast specified;
9- and in the prayers make us alight in the station of the keepers of their stations, the guardians of their pillars, their performers in their times, as Thy servant and Thy messenger set down in his Sunna (Thy blessings be upon him and his Household) in their bowings, their prostrations, and all their excellent acts, with the most complete and ample ritual purity and the most evident and intense humility!
Give us success in this month to tighten our bonds of kin with devotion and gifts, attend to our neighbours with bestowal and giving, rid our possessions from claims, purify them through paying the alms, go back to him who has gone far from us, treat justly him who has wronged us, make peace with him who shows enmity toward us
10- Give us success in this month to tighten our bonds of kin with devotion and gifts, attend to our neighbours with bestowal and giving, rid our possessions from claims, purify them through paying the alms, go back to him who has gone far from us, treat justly him who has wronged us, make peace with him who shows enmity toward us (except him who is regarded as an enemy in Thee and for Thee, for he is the enemy whom we will not befriend, the party whom we will not hold dear),
11- and seek nearness to Thee through blameless works which will purify us from sins and preserve us from renewing faults, so that none of Thy angels will bring for Thee the kinds of obedience and sorts of nearness-seeking unless they be less than what we bring! 3
12- O God, I ask Thee by the right of this month and by the right of him who worships Thee within it from its beginning to the time of its passing, whether angel Thou hast brought nigh to Thee, prophet Thou hast sent, or righteous servant Thou hast singled out, that Thou bless Muhammad and his Household, make us worthy of the generosity Thou hast promised Thy friends, make incumbent for us what Thou hast made incumbent for those who go to great lengths in obeying Thee, and place us in the ranks of those who deserve through Thy mercy the highest elevation!
13- O God, bless Muhammad and his Household, turn us aside from deviation in professing Thy Unity, falling short in magnifying Thee, doubt in Thy religion, blindness toward Thy path, heedlessness of Thy inviolability, and being deceived by Thy enemy, the accursed Satan!
O God, bless Muhammad and his Household, turn us aside from deviation in professing Thy Unity, falling short in magnifying Thee, doubt in Thy religion, blindness toward Thy path, heedlessness of Thy inviolability, and being deceived by Thy enemy, the accursed Satan!
14- O God, bless Muhammad and his Household, and when in every night of this month's nights Thou hast necks which Thy pardon will release and Thy forgiveness disregard, place our necks among those necks and place us among the best folk and companions of this our month!
15- O God, bless Muhammad and his Household, efface our sins along with the effacing of its crescent moon, and make us pass forth from the ill effects of our acts with the passing of its days, until it leaves us behind, while within it Thou hast purified us of offenses and rid us of evil deeds!
16- O God, bless Muhammad and his Household, and should we go off to one side in this month, set us aright; should we swerve, point us straight; and should Thy enemy Satan enwrap us, rescue us from him!
17- O God, fill this month with our worship of Thee, adorn its times with our obedience toward Thee, help us during its daytime with its fast, and in its night with prayer and pleading toward Thee, humility toward Thee, and lowliness before Thee, so that its daytime may not bear witness against our heedlessness, nor its night against our neglect!
O God, fill this month with our worship of Thee, adorn its times with our obedience toward Thee, help us during its daytime with its fast, and in its night with prayer and pleading toward Thee, humility toward Thee, and lowliness before Thee, so that its daytime may not bear witness against our heedlessness, nor its night against our neglect!
18 O God, make us like this in the other months and days as long as Thou givest us life, and place us among Thy righteous servants, those who shall inherit Paradise, therein dwelling forever,4 those who give what they give, while their hearts quake, that they are returning to their Lord,5 those who vie in good works, outracing to them!6
19- O God, bless Muhammad and his Household in every time, in all moments, and in every state, to the number that Thou hast blessed whomsoever Thou hast blessed and to multiples of all that, through multiples which none can count but Thee! Surely Thou art Accomplisher of what Thou desirest!
1. 2:185
2. 97:4-5
3. Sayyid ''Alikhan offers four interpretations for this last clause, three given by earlier commentators and the fourth his own:
(a) so that the acts of obedience and nearness-seeking of the angels will be less than ours;
(b) so that none of the recording angels will bring the record of our sins except that they be less than the kinds of obedience and sorts of nearness seeking that we bring;
(c) so that none of the angels will bring the works of the servants except that they be less than the kinds of obedience and sorts of nearness seeking that we bring;
(d) so that none of the angels will bring our good works except that they be less than the good works that we ourselves bring.
In support of the last reading he cites a hadith from one of the Imams: 'The angel only writes down what it hears, but God has said, Remember thy Lord in thyself, in pleading and fear (7:205). So none knows the reward of the remembrance in the person's self except God.' He concludes that the best interpretation is to say that the passage includes all four of these meanings.
4. 23:11
5. 23:60
6. 23:61
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