ভূমিকা

Shiavault - a Vault of Shia Islamic Books Adab as-Salat: The Disciplines of the Prayer Second Revised Edition Section Eight: Meditation One of the disciplines of reciting the Qur'an is the presence of heart, to which we have already referred in this book, when we discussed the general disciplines of the acts of worship; so, there is no need to repeat it.

Another one of its disciplines is meditation, by which we mean that the reciter of the noble āyah s should look for the destination and the objective.

Now as the objective of the Qur'an, as the very luminous Book says, is guiding the people to the ways of safety, bringing them out of the stages of darkness into the world of light, and leading them to the straight path, one must, by way of meditating on the noble āyah s, attain the stages of safety, from its lowest stage, which belongs to worldly dominion, up to its final stage, which is the realization of a sound heart [ qalb-i sālim ] , according to the explanation received from (' a ) saying that a sound heart meets Allah when it is occupied by none other than Him.[^1] The soundness of the worldly and heavenly powers should be the quest of the reciter of the Qur'an, as he will certainly find it in this heavenly Book if he meditates on it.

When the human powers become safe from Satan's intrusion, and when the way to safety is found and followed, man, in each stage of safety, will be saved from a degree of darkness, and the bright light of Allah will inevitably shine in him.

If he gets rid of all sorts of darkness, the first of which is the darkness of the world of nature, with all its affairs, and the last of which is the darkness of being inclined to multiplicity with all its affairs, the absolute light will shine in his heart, leading him to the straight path of humanity, which is, in this instance, the path of the Lord: “ Surely my Lord is on a straight path.” [^2] Contemplation is very much invited to, praised and applauded in the Glorious Qur'an.

Allah, the Exalted, says: “ And we have revealed to you the Remembrance that you may explain to mankind what has been sent down to them and that haply they may reflect.” [^3] In this noble āyah reflection is strongly applauded, because the aim of sending down this great heavenly Book, the great luminous paper, is that “ haply they may reflect.” This is quite significant that the mere possibility of reflection causes the revelation of this great generosity [ karāmat ] .