Written transcript of the lecture
The Meshkat-e Noor teachings series🌼🔆🌼The Flaw and Its Remedy🌼🔆🌼
🌹🔅☘️ بِسْمِ اللَّهِ الرَّحْمنِ الرَّحيمِ ☘️🔅🌹
🔅🌹 “Moral and Practical Flaws” “Human Graces Gone Missing” “The Horizon of Human Vision” “A Commentary on Supplication 20 of al-Ṣaḥīfa al-Sajjādiyya” “Session 243” and more … Summary with an addendum 1403.12.09 Ali Saei (Abdullah Meshkat) 110.141(903) 🌹🔅
☘️🌷 اللَّهُمَّ لَا تَدَعْ خَصْلَةً تُعَابُ مِنِّي إِلَّا أَصْلَحْتَهَا،
🌹O God, let no trait of mine that is a flaw go unaddressed; set it right.
🌹Whatever counts as a flaw: surely, no trait suits everyone. Indeed, «حسنات الابرار سیئات المقربین».
🌹O God, do not abandon me.
🌹O God, do not leave my flaw unattended.
🌹O God, do not leave me to my flaw.
🌹O God, do not forsake me to my flaw.
🌹O God, take away my flaw and set it right.
🌹Set right the trait that is a flaw; here, “flaw” describes the trait. A trait that is inherently flawed is a defective trait, not an عائبه. Let us attend to both moral and practical flaws.
🌹Each of the vices of character—that is, the troops of ignorance—is among the defective traits. These include evil, disbelief, denial, despair, injustice, anger, ingratitude for blessings, hopelessness, greed, hardness of heart, rage, ignorance, folly, and so on.
🌷🔆الْخَيْرُ وَ هُوَ وَزِيرُ الْعَقْلِ وَ جَعَلَ ضِدَّهُ الشَّرَّ وَ هُوَ وَزِيرُ الْجَهْلِ وَ الْإِيمَانُ وَ ضِدَّهُ الْكُفْرَ- وَ التَّصْدِيقُ وَ ضِدَّهُ الْجُحُودَ وَ الرَّجَاءُ وَ ضِدَّهُ الْقُنُوطَ وَ الْعَدْلُ وَ ضِدَّهُ الْجَوْرَ وَ الرِّضَا وَ ضِدَّهُ السُّخْطَ وَ الشُّكْرُ وَ ضِدَّهُ الْكُفْرَانَ وَ الطَّمَعُ وَ ضِدَّهُ الْيَأْسَ وَ التَّوَكُّلُ وَ ضِدَّهُ الْحِرْصَ وَ الرَّأْفَةُ وَ ضِدَّهَا الْقَسْوَةَ وَ الرَّحْمَةُ وَ ضِدَّهَا الْغَضَبَ وَ الْعِلْمُ وَ ضِدَّهُ الْجَهْلَ وَ الْفَهْمُ وَ ضِدَّهُ الْحُمْقَ وَ الْعِفَّةُ وَ ضِدَّهَا التَّهَتُّكَ وَ الزُّهْدُ وَ ضِدَّهُ الرَّغْبَةَ وَ الرِّفْقُ وَ ضِدَّهُ الْخُرْقَ وَ الرَّهْبَةُ وَ ضِدَّهُ الْجُرْأَةَ وَ التَّوَاضُعُ وَ ضِدَّهُ الْكِبْرَ وَ التُّؤَدَةُ … [1]
☘️🌷 وَ لَا عَائِبَةً أُوَنَّبُ بِهَا إِلَّا حَسَّنْتَهَا،
🌹O God, my Lord! Do not leave any flaw for which I might be reproached; make it good.
🌹Nor leave any flaw for which I might be rebuked harshly, mockingly, bitterly, or with contempt; make it good.
🌹A trait is set right; a flaw is made beautiful.
🌹An عائبه is generative. We might say that an عائبه is an act among acts: it is the craft of fault-finding, the source and promoter of flaws.
🌹Flaws beget more flaws; the tree of flaws, an evil tree, bears fruit.
🌹We might also surmise that عائبه refers to a deep-rooted flaw, any flaw, “your flaw,” the beginning of a flaw, its first shoot, a sign of flaw, a flaw that breeds further flaws, a practical flaw, and so on.
🔅🌼The Whip of Reproach🌼🔅
🌹Reproach has many degrees: from the reproach of one’s conscience, of people, of angels, of earth and heaven, and indeed of all creation, to its highest form: divine rebuke.
🌹But Satan does not reproach; he gloats.
☘️🌷 وَ لَا أُكْرُومَةً فِيَّ نَاقِصَةً إِلَّا أَتْمَمْتَهَا.
🌹Do not leave any incomplete grace within my soul; bring it to completion.
🌹And do not leave any seedling of an incomplete grace within my soul; cultivate it.
🌹Seedlings of nobility, virtue, love, worship, knowledge, and wisdom are among the اکرومه; in general, every noble quality of character is an اکرومه.
🔅🌼Another Gift from Supplication 34🌼🔅
🌷🔆 (1) اللَّهُمَّ لَكَ الْحَمْدُ عَلَى سِتْرِكَ بَعْدَ عِلْمِكَ، وَ مُعَافَاتِكَ بَعْدَ خُبْرِكَ، فَكُلُّنَا قَدِ اقْتَرَفَ الْعَائِبَةَ فَلَمْ تَشْهَرْهُ، وَ ارْتَكَبَ الْفَاحِشَةَ فَلَمْ تَفْضَحْهُ، وَ تَسَتَّرَ بِالْمَسَاوِئِ فَلَمْ تَدْلُلْ عَلَيْهِ.[2]
🌷🔆 O God, all praise is Yours alone for concealing our sins despite knowing them, and for granting us well-being despite being fully aware of our plight. How many among us have done evil, yet You have not made them known for it; committed grave wrongs, yet You have not exposed them before others; and hidden their shameful deeds, yet You have not led anyone to discover them.
🔅🌼 Another gift from Supplication 16 🌼🔅
🌷🔆 (21) يَا إِلَهِي فَلَكَ الْحَمْدُ فَكَمْ مِنْ عَائِبَةٍ سَتَرْتَهَا عَلَيَّ فَلَمْ تَفْضَحْنِي، وَ كَمْ مِنْ ذَنْبٍ غَطَّيْتَهُ عَلَيَّ فَلَمْ تَشْهَرْنِي، وَ كَمْ مِنْ شَائِبَةٍ أَلْمَمْتُ بِهَا فَلَمْ تَهْتِكْ عَنِّي سِتْرَهَا، وَ لَمْ تُقَلِّدْنِي مَكْرُوهَ شَنَارِهَا، وَ لَمْ تُبْدِ سَوْءَاتِهَا لِمَنْ يَلْتَمِسُ مَعَايِبِي مِنْ جِيرَتِي، وَ حَسَدَةِ نِعْمَتِكَ عِنْدِي[3]
🌷🔆 My God, praise be to You! How often You have concealed my faults and spared me public disgrace; how often You have hidden my sins and kept others from knowing them. How many shameful deeds have I committed, yet You have not torn away my veil, placed their burden of blame and disgrace around my neck, or laid bare their evils to my neighbors, who seek out my faults, and to those who envy the blessings You have given me.
🔅🌼 The End of Faults 🌼🔅
🌹One day, faults will die; faults, too, have their death, for they have an appointed term.
🌹By God’s permission, faults may emerge. Though faults are flaws, within the order of wisdom and the trial of creation they play the most beautiful part. In the testing ground of creation, the absence of ugliness and faults would itself be a defect.
🌹The final fault will have its last appearance and emergence at the end of time; the last fault belongs to the end of time.
🌹One day, everything will be swept away—all that is beautiful and all that is ugly. Faults, too, will not escape this fate. In the universe, earth and time will be purified of every stain. When ugliness, faults, and disobedience die, their absence will be no virtue in anyone; virtue belongs to those who kept away from them while they lived.
🌹The essence of faults will come to light in the age of the end times.
🌹People of the end times are like the elders of the universe, its ripened fruit. They should not compare themselves with the earliest human beings. Just as childish behavior is unbecoming in the young and the old, so conduct like that of people of the past is unbecoming in those who live at the end of time.
🔅🌼 Ignorance is the soul and spirit of ugliness and faults 🌼🔅
🌹If ignorance were swept away, neither ugliness, nor fault, nor disobedience would remain.
🌷🔆قَالَ الصَّادِقُ ع الْجَهْلُ صُورَةٌ رُكِّبَتْ فِي بَنِي آدَمَ فِي الدُّنْيَا إِقْبَالُهَا ظُلْمَةٌ وَ إِدْبَارُهَا نُورٌ وَ الْعَبْدُ مُتَقَلِّبٌ مَعَهَا كَتَقَلُّبِ الظِّلِّ مَعَ الشَّمْسِ أَ لَا تَرَى إِلَى الْإِنْسَانِ تَارَةً تَجِدُهُ جَاهِلًا بِخِصَالِ نَفْسِهِ حَامِداً لَهَا عَارِفاً بِعَيْبِهَا فِي غَيْرِهِ سَاخِطاً لَهَا وَ تَارَةً تَجِدُهُ عَالِماً بِطِبَاعِهِ سَاخِطاً لَهَا حَامِداً لَهَا فِي غَيْرِهِ فَهُوَ مُتَقَلِّبٌ بَيْنَ الْعِصْمَةِ وَ الْخِذْلَانِ فَإِنْ قَابَلَتْهُ الْعِصْمَةُ أَصَابَ وَ إِنْ قَابَلَهُ الْخِذْلَانُ أَخْطَأَ وَ مِفْتَاحُ الْجَهْلِ الرِّضَا وَ الِاعْتِقَادُ بِهِ وَ مِفْتَاحُ الْعِلْمِ الِاسْتِبْدَالُ مَعَ إِصَابَةِ مُرَافَقَةِ التَّوْفِيقِ وَ أَدْنَى صِفَةِ الْجَاهِلِ دَعْوَاهُ بِالْعِلْمِ بِلَا اسْتِحْقَاقٍ وَ أَوْسَطُهُ جَهْلُهُ بِالْجَهْلِ وَ أَقْصَاهُ جُحُودُهُ بِالْعِلْمِ وَ لَيْسَ شَيْءٌ إِثْبَاتُهُ حَقِيقَةُ نَفْيِهِ إِلَّا الْجَهْلُ وَ الدُّنْيَا وَ الْحِرْصُ فَالْكُلُّ مِنْهُمْ كَوَاحِدٍ وَ الْوَاحِدُ مِنْهُمْ كَالْكُل[4]
🌷🔆Ignorance is an element woven into human nature: its coming is darkness, and its passing is light.
Human beings are always accompanied by this element, as the sun is by its shadow.
Do you not see how a person may be unaware of the qualities he possesses and praise them in himself, yet find fault with those very qualities in others and grow angry with them?
And how he may be dissatisfied with his own nature and character, even as he admires and praises the same qualities in others?
Such is the human being, caught between success and failure.
When success comes to his aid, he acts rightly;
when failure is his lot, he acts wrongly.
The key to ignorance is self-conceit and self-assurance,
and the key to knowledge is to change this trait within oneself—provided, of course, that one is granted success.
The first degree of ignorance is to claim knowledge without being qualified to do so.
The next is not to know that one is ignorant.
The final degree is to deny knowledge, learning and their worth.
There is nothing whose affirmation is, in reality, its own negation except ignorance, worldliness and greed:
each is like the whole, and the whole like each one of them.
🔅🌼 The Best Order and the Ugliest Flaws 🌼🔅
🌹Any departure from the best order is the ugliest of flaws.
🌹The finest and best order of human existence is made possible by tawhid, the affirmation of God’s oneness. The tawhidic order is the human being’s primordial nature; any deviation from it leaves a person captive to defect and imperfection.
🌹One who strays from the primordial nature of tawhid is ensnared in polytheism and doubt. This dark defect makes a person imperfect in every respect: in understanding and knowledge, and in the capacity to experience pleasure, sense beauty and make distinctions.
🌻🔆al-Rum: 30 فَأَقِمْ وَجْهَكَ لِلدِّينِ حَنيفاً فِطْرَتَ اللَّهِ الَّتي فَطَرَ النَّاسَ عَلَيْها لا تَبْديلَ لِخَلْقِ اللَّهِ ذلِكَ الدِّينُ الْقَيِّمُ وَ لكِنَّ أَكْثَرَ النَّاسِ لا يَعْلَمُونَ
🔆So turn your face steadfastly towards the true religion of your Lord—the primordial nature upon which God created humankind. There is no altering God’s creation. That is the upright religion, though most people do not know.
🌻🔆al-Tin: 4 لَقَدْ خَلَقْنَا الْإِنْسانَ في أَحْسَنِ تَقْويمٍ
🔆Indeed, We created the human being in the finest order.
🌻🔆al-Tin: 5 ثُمَّ رَدَدْناهُ أَسْفَلَ سافِلينَ
🔆Then We brought him down to the lowest of the low.
🌹Anything beautiful becomes ugly when the primordial nature is warped.
🌹Countless arts, without tawhid, are but a mirage of beauty: they have no light, like a sun without radiance; they are sheer darkness.
🌹The sweetness and flavour of a person devoted to tawhid, a flower devoted to tawhid, a spouse devoted to tawhid—these are beyond description and expression.
🔅🌼 To Stray from the Primordial Nature Is to Stray from the Creator 🌼🔅
🌹Whoever distances himself from the Presence of the Creator is drawn towards polytheism.
🌹Distance from the Beautiful One, whose names are delightful and whose remembrance is sweet, the Perfect One, leaves a person base, insignificant, flawed and incomplete.
🌹Humanity has fallen from perfection into imperfection, from high to low. Now it must ascend from low to high.
🌹The best order of human existence is incompatible with this body, its form, its intestines and its concealed organs. Humankind has been transformed, disciplined and cast down.
🌹Humanity was meant to rise from the best and most complete form of existence beyond itself, beyond growth and towards noble qualities! Instead, it has become the equal of inanimate things, plants and animals—or even lower than them.
🔅🌼 Humanity Lost 🌼🔅
🌹Which part of the human being has become defective? You have no wings with which to fly, nor a mind with which to think, though your thought should have spanned the whole universe of being.
🌹What is lacking among the human faculties, and what flaw has been added? Through sin, humanity has lost its highest faculties; its greater world has vanished.
🌹Which of our senses is incomplete? Why do we think like animals, concerned only with food and desire?
🌻🔆الأعراف : 96 وَ لَوْ أَنَّ أَهْلَ الْقُرى آمَنُوا وَ اتَّقَوْا لَفَتَحْنا عَلَيْهِمْ بَرَكاتٍ مِنَ السَّماءِ وَ الْأَرْضِ وَ لكِنْ كَذَّبُوا فَأَخَذْناهُمْ بِما كانُوا يَكْسِبُونَ
🔆Had the people of the towns and villages believed and been mindful of God, We would have opened up for them blessings from heaven and earth. But they denied the truth, so We punished them for what they used to do.
🌹With true faith and God-consciousness, beauty would well up and blossom in the human body and soul. Beauty would shine forth from the earth and sky within the human being, and transcendent memory would take root in the soul.
🌹Await the Imam of the Age, peace be upon him, and you will behold the highest vision.
🔅🌼 Lofty blessings 🌼🔅
🌹The blessings that descend from heaven to earth are not limited to water and bread.
🌹Why does humanity not reflect on the blessings of existence, life, intellect, spirit, and servitude to God?!
🔅🌼 The human horizon of vision has fallen 🌼🔅
🌻🔆ق : 6 أَ فَلَمْ يَنْظُرُوا إِلَى السَّماءِ فَوْقَهُمْ كَيْفَ بَنَيْناها وَ زَيَّنَّاها وَ ما لَها مِنْ فُرُوجٍ
🔆Have they not looked at the sky above them—how We built it and adorned it with stars, with no cracks or flaws in it?
🌻🔆الأعراف : 185 أَ وَ لَمْ يَنْظُرُوا في مَلَكُوتِ السَّماواتِ وَ الْأَرْضِ وَ ما خَلَقَ اللَّهُ مِنْ شَيْءٍ وَ أَنْ عَسى أَنْ يَكُونَ قَدِ اقْتَرَبَ أَجَلُهُمْ فَبِأَيِّ حَديثٍ بَعْدَهُ يُؤْمِنُونَ
🔆Have they not contemplated the dominion and order of the heavens and the earth, and all that God has created? Have they not considered that perhaps their end is near? If they do not believe in this clear scripture, what message will they believe in after it?
🌹Humanity, then, has the capacity to survey the whole universe at once. Why, then, does it not broaden its vision?!
🌹Where have we lost our sight and vision? Why are we blind? Where has the heart gone?
🔅🌼 Journeying through “God’s earth” restores the human being’s higher faculties 🌼🔅
🌻🔆الحج : 46 أَ فَلَمْ يَسيرُوا فِي الْأَرْضِ فَتَكُونَ لَهُمْ قُلُوبٌ يَعْقِلُونَ بِها أَوْ آذانٌ يَسْمَعُونَ بِها فَإِنَّها لا تَعْمَى الْأَبْصارُ وَ لكِنْ تَعْمَى الْقُلُوبُ الَّتي فِي الصُّدُورِ
🔆Have they not journeyed through the land, so that they might have hearts with which to understand the truth, or ears with which to hear? It is not the eyes that grow blind, but the hearts within the breasts that grow blind.
🌹The earth meant here is the earth of the Qur’an, the land of the Word of God, which carries the human being aloft to the heaven of the Word of God.
🌷🔆سُئِلَ الصَّادِقُ ع عَنْ قَوْلِ اللَّهِ عَزَّ وَ جَلَ أَ وَ لَمْ يَسِيرُوا فِي الْأَرْضِ قَالَ مَعْنَاهُ أَ وَ لَمْ يَنْظُرُوا فِي الْقُرْآنِ.[5]
🔆Imam al-Sadiq was asked about the interpretation of these words of God, Mighty and Exalted—[“Have they not journeyed through the land…?”]. He replied: “It means: Have they not reflected on the Qur’an?” أَ فَلَمْ یَسِیرُوا فِی الْأَرْضِ;
🌹Let us seek from its rightful source the mysteries of journeying through the Qur’an’s earth and sky.
🌹Journeying and spiritual wayfaring through the Qur’an’s outward and inward dimensions is the duty of God’s servants.
🔅🌼 The Imam of the Age, peace be upon him: the true, pure Imam, without flaw or deficiency 🌼🔅
🌹Human beings are not meant to bring themselves up to the speed of light; they must bring the light up to their own speed. The perfected human possesses the highest speed in all existence.
🌹The end-times are an era in which the highest form of the human being comes to full flower. The human seed has opened, and must now reach its ultimate fulfillment.
🌹With the Imam of his time, humanity will behold its final form.
🌹To understand the Imam of the Age, peace be upon him, one needs a memory as vast as the whole of existence, for he is the Clear Book and the Manifest Imam in whom all things are encompassed.
🌼Ali Saei (Abdullah Meshkat) 110.141(903)🌼
🔅🌼Meanings drawn from «Riyāḍ al-Sālikīn»🌼🔅
☘️Al-khaṣlah means a trait or state; the phrase «تعاب» functions as an adjective in the accusative, modifying khaṣlah.
☘️Al-ʿāʾibah is a verbal noun meaning “defect,” formed on the pattern fāʿilah, like ʿāfiyah and ʿāqibah.
☘️Bring the noble sapling to fruition.
☘️The spelling al-ʿāyibah, with yāʾ, follows the regular pattern and is the form found in reliable manuscripts. The hamza found in some copies is not to be relied upon. It means any trait that has a defect, from ʿāba al-shayʾu, used intransitively: when something becomes defective.
☘️One says: ʿāba al-matāʿu ʿayban—following the pattern of ṣāra—meaning “the goods became defective”; hence ʿāʾib, “defective.” One may also say ʿābahu ṣāḥibuhu, “its owner found fault with it,” in which case the verb is transitive; it can also be used intransitively.
☘️Annabahu taʾnīban means “he rebuked and blamed him.”
☘️It has also been said that the word denotes emphatic rebuke and reproach.
☘️Ūʾannabu bihā, in the passive, means “I am rebuked and blamed for it.”
☘️Al-ukrūmah, with ḍamma on the hamza, is a noun derived from karam, “generosity,” just as al-uʿjūbah is derived from ʿajab, “wonder.”
☘️In al-Qāmūs: “It is the act of generosity.”
☘️Nāqiṣah, in the accusative, is another adjective describing it.
☘️He says: This is if we take nāqiṣah as an active participle. But if we take it as a verbal noun, like al-fātiḥah, al-ʿāfiyah and al-kādhibah, the meaning is: “Whenever a noble quality is deficient, I remove its deficiency and bring it to perfection.”
☘️He then censures those who vocalize «فيّ» with a doubled yāʾ and put nāqiṣah in the accusative, saying: “Among those of limited understanding in our time are people unable to make their way to obscure meanings or find a way through the narrow passages of difficult problems. They altered it to «فيّ ناقصة», attaching ‘fī’ to the first-person pronoun and doubling the yāʾ through assimilation, while putting nāqiṣah in the accusative as an adjective modifying ukrūmah, itself in the accusative as the object. This distortion found its way into modern copied manuscripts, and they failed to notice its flaws in two respects:”
☘️That is: “Do not leave any blameworthy trait in me unreformed, under any circumstances; nor leave any fault for which I might be rebuked
☘️unimproved, under any circumstances; nor leave any noble quality in me incomplete, under any circumstances—complete it.”
☘️The meaning is: Whenever there is a trait in me that may be criticized, reform it; whenever there is a fault for which I may be rebuked, improve it; and whenever there is a noble quality that remains incomplete, bring it to completion.
🔅🌼A student’s perspective on “the death of ugliness and sin”🌼🔅
🌻🔆The Death of Ugliness and Sin🔆🌻
🌼🔆🌼The End of Faults and Deficiencies🌼🔆🌼
🔹Weekly sessions on the explanation and interpretation of al-Ṣaḥīfa al-Sajjādiyya (Supplication 20)
📅 Date: 1403/12/09 – 28 Shaʿbān 1446
✨ Session: Meshkat-e Noor
🎤 Speaker: Master Ali Saei
📝 Some points raised during the session:
### A prayer for freedom from faults and the reform of the self 🙏
O God, do not leave me to myself, nor leave my faults unattended!
Do not abandon me with my faults or leave me in their care!
Lord, O God, take away my faults and set them right!
O God, do not let my faults bring me low and humiliate me in their grasp!
Our Lord, our Worshipped One!
### A Prayer for the Rectification of Inner Flaws 🌿
O God, leave no flaw in me unaddressed—
no flaw that makes me deserving of blame. O God, do not leave it as it is!
Make that flaw good!
### Seeking Perfection in Virtues and Excellence in Character ✨
Leave no fault for which I might be blamed unless You make it good!
O God, if any virtue or noble quality in my soul is deficient, leave it incomplete no longer; bring it to perfection!
O God, my Lord! اللهم لا تدع…
### Rectifying Imperfect and Undesirable Qualities 🛤
O God, do not leave any quality in my soul that is considered a fault as it is; set it right!
Any quality that counts as a fault in me!
Not every quality suits everyone;
حسناتُ الأبرار، سیّئاتُ المقرّبین!
—
### The Demise of Ignorance and the End of the Age of Sin 🌎
O God, if You leave me burdened with that low and flawed quality, my greater world will be flawed!
In this age, humanity stands at the final moments of its worldly life!
The final flaw in existence is about to reveal itself; the ultimate degree of imperfection will make itself known in this world!
For the time has come for flaws to be brought to an end!
It is the End Times! Everything will reach its end!
Sin will reach the end of the road, and its time will soon be over, God willing!
The time will come for flaws to die, for ignorance itself will be swept away!
When ignorance is swept away, every flaw in existence will vanish and be destroyed!
No trace of it will remain!
When ignorance is gone, flaws too will perish!
All ugliness, all sin, all disobedience, all mischief will be destroyed!
The ignorance that now surrounds us will come to an end!
### The Nature of Ignorance and Its Effect on Humanity ⚫️
Ignorance has a face!
Ignorance has a distinct reality!
This ignorance has an independent identity, a meaning of its own!
It is not merely an absence of knowledge; it has its own army and retinue!
Ignorance is woven into the human soul;
its life belongs solely to the world below!
When ignorance turns toward a person, when darkness appears,
darkness envelops the human soul!
But when ignorance turns away, the person is immersed in light and radiance!
In this world, a person has no choice but to contend with this ignorance;
it courses through the human soul, remains alongside it, and dwells within us.
Like a shadow moving with the sun;
when the sun moves, the shadow too appears!
Ignorance is just like that shadow!
So long as there is light, there will be shadow!
### Ignorance Swept Away by the Light of God 🌞
When a person’s light reaches the crown of his head, there will be no darkness left!
It will be swept away all at once!
When the light of the Qur’an and the Ahl al-Bayt envelops a person’s entire being,
ignorance will have no chance to show itself!
Now is the time of the end times!
This ignorance is destined to be swept away all at once!
When the sun of God rises,
it will envelop every soul!
Will there be any room left for ignorance?!
When ignorance is destroyed, faults, too, will be destroyed!
### The Destruction of Faults at the End of the Age of Ignorance 🌍
Faults are destined to be destroyed!
### The Role of Knowledge in Eradicating Faults 📖
If knowledge does not remove faults from a person’s soul before their departure from this world and death,
they will fail the test of knowledge and ignorance!
For they themselves will have played no part in eradicating faults!
I swear by God! The earth will be purified!
It will be freed of every fault, every stain and impurity!
This is a test!
—
### Standing Firm in the Light Against Darkness 🌊
A person must face this very ignorance and sin, yet remain untainted!
Can someone immersed in light become tainted by darkness?!
Someone immersed in purity, someone plunged into clear, life-giving water—
would grime dare to penetrate their soul?!
### The Qualities of a Person of the End Times 🏛
We are living in the end times!
The beings of the end times are like the elders of this world!
They are the ripened fruit of this existence!
Let us not, in this end-times moment and station,
compare ourselves with the first and earlier generations!
Such a comparison would be like comparing an elder with an unknowing child!
Just as it would be blameworthy for a young person or an elder to imitate a child’s behaviour,
so if people of the end times behave like those of earlier generations,
they will not only be brought low and humiliated, but will deserve the harshest reproach!
### The End Times and Humanity’s Fall ⏳
This is the age of the end times!
Humanity’s infancy is over, so why does this person of the end times act like a nursing infant?!
Indeed, like the young of animals!
Not even like human infants!
How far humanity of this age has fallen!
He has fallen prey to the worst of flaws!
So let us wholeheartedly recite this supplication of Imam Sajjad (AS):
اللَّهُمَّ لَا تَدَعْ خَصْلَةً تُعَابُ مِنِّي إِلَّا أَصْلَحْتَهَا، وَ لَا عَائِبَةً أُوَنَّبُ بِهَا إِلَّا حَسَّنْتَهَا، وَ لَا أُكْرُومَةً فِيَّ نَاقِصَةً إِلَّا أَتْمَمْتَهَا.
### Asking God to rectify our flaws 🌿
O God! Do not leave any trait in my soul that is a flaw in me without rectifying it!
Indeed, some traits are themselves flaws!
A flaw is an attribute of a trait!
In another passage, this flaw is different from the first one!
The first flaw encompasses the trait itself; in the next passage, however, the flaw is deep-rooted!
O God, do not abandon me!
Do not leave my flaw unaddressed!
Do not leave me to my flaw!
Do not abandon me to my defect!
Do not leave me to myself!
Do not leave me to my trait unless You rectify it!
A trait that is inherently a flaw!
### Moral and intellectual flaws: enemies of human growth ⚖️
This supplication points to moral flaws!
We must attend both to our moral failings and to the flaws in our actions!
Every noble virtue stands opposed to one of the hosts of ignorance!
These are the same defective traits that must be rectified!
They must be disciplined!
This is evil set against good!
Disbelief set against faith!
Denial set against affirmation!
Despair set against hope!
Injustice set against justice!
Anger set against contentment!
Ingratitude for blessings set against gratitude for them!
These must be rectified so that a person may walk the path of truth!
### Asking for deep-rooted flaws to be rectified 🔄
And do not leave any flaw for which I might be censured unless You make it good!
“ʿĀʾibah” means a flaw—perhaps a deep-rooted one, or perhaps one that encompasses all flaws!
Or it may be “ʿaybuka,” or the first sprout of a flaw!
Or a flaw that gives rise to others!
Or perhaps it is the flaw in one’s actions!
Which is it?
Whatever it is, it is a “ʿāʾibah”: something ugly that must be uprooted!
Any flaw that makes a person deserving of resentment, harshness, hatred, reprimand, and blame—
O God, remove such a flaw from me!
Do not leave me to it!
Make it good!
A “trait” can be rectified, but a “flaw” must be praised!
### The conscience’s rebuke: the bitterest reproach 🌀
The human conscience lashes out and reproaches its owner!
The bitterest reproach of all is the reproach of one’s own conscience!
People reproach us!
The angels reproach us!
The very earth, the very air we draw into our lungs, reproaches us—indeed, curses us!
The stars, the galaxies, and everything in the universe reproach us!
Every part of the body reproaches us!
### Divine Reproach and the Devil’s Gloating ⚖️
The highest reproach is God’s rebuke!
No one can bear it!
But the devil does not reproach us!
Instead of reproaching us, he gloats over us!
With his gloating, he blackens us, torments us, and makes us wretched and disgraced!
Indeed, a person’s flaws multiply and bear fruit!
May the “forbidden tree” never be left untended!
For it will bear bitter fruit.
### A Prayer to Cultivate Virtues and Goodness 🌱
O God! Do not leave that “nobility”—that goodness of the soul—incomplete; bring it to perfection!
O God! Nurture that “nobility” Yourself; be its cultivator!
O God! If there is a sapling of goodness in my soul, if I have any fine quality, turn Your gaze upon it!
Cultivate it!
Bring it Yourself to become a “goodly tree”!
Make its fruits sweet!
These “noble qualities” are the highest virtues of character!
They are the saplings of the nobility within us!
Our virtues:
✨ love, worship, goodness, faith, affirmation, contentment, and gratitude
are all “noble qualities of our souls”!
So the land of a human being’s existence must become a garden of beauty and sublime virtues!
And its cultivator must be Allah, Blessed and Exalted!
### Gratitude for God’s Concealment of Our Faults 🕊
In another passage, the adornment of the righteous prays thus:
“O Lord! All praise is Yours for concealing our faults, despite Your knowledge of them!”
“And for granting us well-being, despite Your awareness of them!”
### Humanity’s Efforts to Acquire Faults and Shame 🔄
With all our heart and soul, we strove to acquire faults and bring shame upon ourselves!
We wore ourselves out!
We stained our very being with faults!
But, O God! You did not make our faults the mark by which we were known!
You did not make us notorious for our faults!
We attached ourselves to ugliness, but You did not expose us to disgrace!
You did not make us a laughingstock!
Humanity clothed itself in ugliness and wickedness!
It donned garments of ugliness!
But You, my Lord, did not guide him to his ugliness!
O God, You made him unaware of the ugly garment he has put on!
He plunged himself into ugliness, disgrace and humiliation, but You, O One and Only God, let him remain unaware of this truth!
### Praise to God for Concealing Our Faults and Sins 🌿
Elsewhere, he prays in these words:
“O my God, all praise belongs to You alone!
How many a blemish You have concealed!
You showed me kindness and drew a veil over those faults; You did not expose me or bring me to shame!
And how many sins You have hidden and kept secret! You showed me kindness, concealed my faults and covered my sins, and did not make me known for them!”
### The Human Being’s Ideal Order and Its Collapse 🔄
The ideal order of human existence is at odds with the form and condition we see today!
What has this human being done to himself to fall into such misery?!
What kind of condition is this, that he must cover himself?!
He was meant to show himself, yet now he is forced to hide!
He has disfigured his beautiful limbs!
What shape has he taken on?!
How have his insides come to be in such a state?!
### The Human Being’s Inner Light and Fall into Darkness 🌞
Light should shine out from the human heart!
The human being should have illuminated the face of the sun!
But now he needs a sun above his head!
He was meant to adorn God’s Throne,
but now he has marred the face of the earth!
His faults have disfigured him!
This human being is broken and flawed!
He has fallen!
But he must return!
He must set out on a journey toward perfection!
This human being, who was in the “ideal order,”
was meant to soar from it, but instead he has fallen!
What has he come to?!
He has sunk lower than inanimate things!
No wonder a stone would boast over him!
What kind of creature is this human being?!
With his faults, he has sunk below the beasts!
### Humanity Lost in the Darkness of Its Faults 🌫
Through its faults, humanity has lost itself!
Humanity is lost!
It has lost its beauty!
It has lost its ideal order!
Where did it leave it behind and abandon it?!
How far has it fallen?!
It has been afflicted by the worst of faults: ignorance!
It has left nothing of itself!
This human being has a history spanning billions of years, yet remembers only a few years of their life!
Because their innate nature has been forgotten and locked away!
In this age, this human being has neither wings to fly nor a mind to think!
This human being was meant to expand to embrace the whole expanse of existence!
### Humanity, blind in the arena of sin 👁
This human being was meant to be the eye of the cosmos!
They were meant to be the eye of thought for all existence!
But now they rely on every celestial body to help them see a little better and overcome their blindness!
Indeed, in the arena of sin, humanity has lost its way!
The greater world within the human being has vanished without a trace!
What greater flaw could there be than this?
### Humanity, animal-like and captive to lust and appetite 🍖
Humanity has fallen into a flaw that makes it think like an animal!
All it thinks about is its stomach and its desires!
What a terrible predicament!
This human being was meant to be a blessing for earth and sky!
But now, they hold out a begging hand in every direction!
Let us not imagine that blessings are limited to water and bread!
Humanity needs blessings of being, life, knowledge, spirit and servitude to God!
It must attain all these blessings!
### The way to be freed from flaws and shortcomings 🤲
What are we to do?
We must appeal to God’s grace and forgiveness!
We must recite the supplication of Imam Sajjad (AS)!
We must raise our voices and pray!
So that our God may mend our faults and traits, and make them good!
So that every blessing may spring up and flourish within our souls!
So that the land of our being may be filled with the beauty, benevolence and grace of the Almighty Lord!
Yet the human being has been blinded and does not even know it!
Isn’t this blindness a flaw?
It is the greatest flaw of all!
The horizons of human vision have fallen low!
Have they not looked at the sky—how We built it, adorned it, and left no cracks in it?
Humanity was meant to look!
But its sight has been blinded!
By God, I am blind and unaware!
This unawareness of one’s blindness is the worst of flaws!
A flaw that has engulfed my soul and my understanding!
### A gaze upon the unseen realm, a gaze upon knowledge 🌍
Have they not gazed upon the dominion of the heavens and the earth?
And upon what God created from nothing?
Humanity, then, has the capacity to survey the whole of existence at once!
This noble verse brings me back to myself!
I must pay attention!
I must see the kingdom of the heavens and the earth!
But I am blind and unaware!
My eyes have fallen, have plummeted, and I myself am oblivious!
### The Path Back to Sight and Knowledge 🔄
What am I to do?
How shall I regain my sight and my knowledge?
أَفَلَمْ يَسِيرُوا فِي الْأَرْضِ فَتَكُونَ لَهُمْ قُلُوبٌ يَعْقِلُونَ بِهَا
This is the “presentation of the Quran”!
I must journey through the “presentation of time,” through the presentation of the Quran!
If I can undertake a spiritual journey into the heart of the Quran,
I shall find my heart, and with it I shall reason!
That eye which was meant to gaze upon the kingdom of the heavens and the earth must return!
O Lord!
Take my hand, take my heart, take my foot!
Guide me along the path of my journey toward You!
### The Human Being: Between the “Best Order” and the “Most Repugnant Flaws” ⚖️
Yes, the human being, in his “best order,” is beautiful!
On one side, he is in the best order; on the other, he is disgraced in the “most repugnant flaws”!
But this human being of the end of time…
shall be sullied by the strangest and most repugnant of flaws!
He, with a hundred-percent departure from his own primordial nature, shall drown himself in his own ugliness!
### Distance from Primordial Nature, Fall from the Best Order 🌌
To whatever degree we distance ourselves from our primordial nature, to that same degree have we distanced ourselves from our best order!
Distance from the best order means being sullied by the most repugnant flaws!
The best order is none other than divine oneness!
The order of divine oneness and primordial nature is a single, unified reality!
If a human being wishes to reach that exalted order, he must keep his primordial nature alive!
He must make divine oneness sovereign over his being!
Divine oneness is like salt! It is divine oneness that gives flavor to everything!
If there is no divine oneness, a beautiful face will have no taste at all! No pleasure at all!
If the sun above our heads were to turn away from divine oneness, by God, we would have the blackest and darkest of skies!
It is this divine oneness that shines!
It is this monotheistic human being who is sweet!
By God! A beautiful flower and its beauty are due to its divine oneness!
Every beautiful being is beautiful because of its divine oneness!
Otherwise, it would be nothing but a mirage of beauty!
It would have no taste!
From afar, people would rush toward it, but when they draw near, they would find it hollow and worthless, and would resolve to flee!
### The Truth of Beauty and Fleeing from False Beauties 🏃♂️
No mirage of beauty has ever left a true taste in the human soul!
The “monotheistic couple” is beyond description!
Let us flee from the mirage of beauty, from false beauties!
Let us hasten toward divine oneness!
Let us embrace anyone who carries within them the jewel of divine unity!
And let us flee from anyone who lacks this jewel!
Just as we flee from wild beasts!
Any departure from the jewel of divine unity will leave a person captive to flaws and deficiencies!
Anyone who strays from their innate nature will fall prey to polytheism and doubt!
This deficiency is utter darkness!
It will diminish a person in every way!
The further we drift from understanding and knowledge, the further we have strayed from that very system of divine unity!
### Straying from the System of Divine Unity: The Soul’s Darkness 🌑
Anyone who strays from their system of divine unity will find their joy, understanding, and knowledge darkened!
Let us turn all our attention to the “upright religion”!
This is the way to salvation!
This is the way to be freed from every flaw!
Let us take refuge in God!
May He keep us steadfast in His own upright religion!
May our Lord not leave us to ourselves!
May He Himself protect us!
May He never leave us, even for an instant, to anything other than His divine unity!
### Falling into the Ravine of Flaws and Depravity ⚠️
When a person falls from the best of all systems, they will be swallowed up in the ravine of flaws!
“The lowest of the low” means a pit of depravity!
A whirlpool of flaws and deficiencies!
Every deviation from one’s innate nature is a deviation from the Creator!
How can a person flee from their Creator after turning their back on their innate nature?!
To turn away from God and remembrance is to drown in darkness, plunge into the depths of flaws, become deficient, and fall from the heights to the depths!
If this person has fallen, they must return!
If they have spent years following the path of polytheism and wearied themselves, they must return!
If they have reached the end of their life and nurtured the seedling of polytheism within themselves, they must return!
If they do not return, they will drag others into that same pit, even as they themselves lie in the lowest of the low!
### The Final Manifestation of Creation: Preparing for the Imam of the Age (AJ) 🌱
Indeed, the final form of creation is destined to appear in this universe!
The seed of humanity must blossom into its final form and bring it to manifestation!
This seed has split open and blossomed!
It must reach the fullest extent of its growth!
How?
That is why the people of the world await the Master, Baqiyyat Allah al-A‘zam (may my soul be his ransom)!
Are we ready to receive the Imam of the Age (AJ)?!
Do we realize that to comprehend his presence, we must possess a memory with the capacity to encompass the entire universe?!
For the Imam of the Age (AJ) is the very “Clear Imam”!
We must bring ourselves into alignment with that Imam!
Are we ready, or have our eyes still not opened?!
We must reach the Imam of the Time (AJ)!
He is the “Gate of God”!
We must pass through this gate!
The mysteries lie beyond this gate!
🎥 Watch the full lecture at the link below:
🔗 Jame Jan website
🌍 jamejan.com
🟠 Jame Jan Eitaa channel
🔗 https://eitaa.com/jamejan
[1] Al-Kafi (Islamic edition), vol. 1, p. 21 Al-Kulayni, Muhammad ibn Ya‘qub ibn Ishaq, Islamic Books Publishing House, Tehran, 4th ed., 1407 AH.
[2]An excerpt from Supplication 34 of al-Sahifa al-Sajjadiyya
[3]An excerpt from Supplication 16 of al-Sahifa al-Sajjadiyya
[4] Misbah al-Shari‘a, p. 75Attributed to Ja‘far ibn Muhammad, A‘lami, Beirut, 1st ed., 1400 AH.
[5] Al-Khisal, vol. 2, p. 396 Ibn Babawayh, Society of Seminary Teachers, Qom, 1st ed., 1362 SH.
