The Higher Mystery of the Blessed Month of Ramadan

🌻🔆🔆🌻
🌼🔆🌼Scaling the Heights of the Divine Attributes🌼🔆🌼

🔹 Weekly sessions on the commentary and interpretation of al-Sahifa al-Sajjadiyya
📅 Date: 1403/12/16 — 5 Ramadan 1446
✨ Session: Meshkat-e Noor
🎤 Speaker: Master Ali Saei
📝 Some of the topics discussed in the session:

Ramadan: an unparalleled highway to divine good pleasure 🌙

O blessed month of Ramadan!
You are one of the unparalleled highways leading to “God’s good pleasure”!

“The Month of God” is the month that carries us to “meeting the Exalted, the Well-Pleased” with the greatest speed and swiftness!
It raises us to the heights of “God’s good pleasure”!

Indeed, blessed Ramadan is the “ladder of God”!
The highest ladder leading to God!
The one that brings us to “the Garden of Good Pleasure”!

It is “the Month of God”!
It is “the Month of Ramadan”!
And Ramadan is one of God’s names!
One of His most mysterious names!

But who is there who knows “Ramadan”?
Who knows who—or what—Ramadan is?

Ramadan: the month of fasting, a month of setting aside all but God 🏙

“Ramadan” is “the Month of God”!
It is the month of standing firm!
It is “the month of fasting”!
It is “the month of standing”!
Standing apart from all but God!

It is “the month of shutting down”!
Shutting down all that is not God!

“The Month of God” has come so that we may cease!
So that we may bring things to a halt!
So that every marketplace apart from God may fall silent and stop!

“The Month of God” has come to straighten our path, turning us away from every wrong road and toward “God’s good pleasure”!

Blessed Ramadan has come so that we may blossom!
So that we may turn clay into a flower!
So that we may be pure!
So that we may be freed from every stain and impurity!
So that we may be released from all that is vile!

So long as the sweetness of honey and syrup does not flow from within, a person should question themselves!
The journey is not over yet!
The destination has not been reached!
The perfection of sincerity has not yet been attained!

When light wells up from within a person, when nothing but beauty shines forth from them…
then they have arrived!
Then they have become truly “Ramadan-like”!

Blessed Ramadan has come so that we may understand that we must become “pure”!
So that we may become “sincere”!

But what must we be freed from?
The “disliked things”?

Ah, no!
Not only the disliked things, but every “commendable thing”!
We must move beyond them all!
We must pass beyond all God-given blessings and leap into “the Garden of God’s good pleasure”!

The way of Ramadan, the way of God: the undisclosed secret of this month 🛤

This is the way of Ramadan!
The way of God!
A way leading to God!

Here lies a new secret!
The undisclosed secret of “blessed Ramadan”!

A person must move beyond all of God’s blessings!
They must not stop at “God’s signs”!

God’s signs are guides!
They point the way, so that we may set out and reach our destination!

If a person has gone astray, they must set themselves right!

If we were to sum up “the essence of blessed Ramadan” in a single sentence, it would be this:
“The perfection of sincerity لَهُ نَفْیُ الصِّفاتِ عَنْهُ”

Let us consider these words—the destination of tawhid—from two perspectives:
✅ We must attain “theoretical tawhid”!
✅ We must also attain “practical tawhid”!

But how?

A very hidden secret lies within these words of our Master!
That is, moving beyond everything that is an “attribute”!
That is, moving beyond everything that is a “sign”!

That is, conquering every peak of God’s attributes!
Conquering every peak of God’s signs!

And when those peaks have been conquered…
There, at last, is our destination!
We have arrived!

The true meaning of “إنا لله و إنا إلیه راجعون” 🔄

“إِنَّا لِلَّهِ وَإِنَّا إِلَيْهِ رَاجِعُونَ” finds its meaning there!
It means traversing every “سُبُلٌ إِلَى اللَّهِ”!

When every path has been travelled…
When every path has come to an end…
Then it is all over!
“We have arrived”!

We have arrived “beyond the attributes”!
We have arrived “beyond servitude to God”!

And here is where our servitude to God is truly affirmed!
Here, at last, it is time to “meet the Beloved”!

“کمالُ الإخلاصِ لَهُ”
Perhaps this was a mystery we had not yet discovered!

The blessings and mercy of Ramadan: a gift that remains in our souls 🎁

What is the “blessing” of Ramadan?
What makes the blessed month of Ramadan so “blessed”?

It is that, at every moment, and with every turn toward it, this month grants us a share of its matchless gifts of grace!
This month makes us “recipients of God’s gracious gifts”!

God’s month has come to His servants!
And through Ramadan, we are continually surrounded by blessing and blessedness!

The blessed month came bearing “blessing,” “mercy,” and “forgiveness”!
Not to take them away…
but to “bring them”!

It brought “blessing,” “mercy,” and “forgiveness”!
So that they might take root in our souls!

And God Most High does not take back His gifts!
Those blessings, mercies, and acts of forgiveness must grow within us!
They must blossom!

Ramadan and the blessed human being: blessing shared both ways 🌙✨

The blessed month and the blessed human being are a blessing to one another!
The servant to the month, and the month to the servant!
We should all be a blessing to one another!

A human being should become, for all of creation, “a sign of God’s blessing”!

If only we knew the “grace and sanctity” of the blessed month!
If only we could attain true knowledge of “Ramadan,” of “the blessed month of Ramadan”!

اللهم عرّفْنی نفسک…
اللهم عرّفْنی نام مقدس رمضانت…
اللهم عرّفْنی حرمت ماه مبارکت…
O God, make me aware of everything I need to know!

If only we knew the greatness of the blessed month!
And from the depths of our hearts wished that the whole year were the blessed month of Ramadan!

Wishing that the whole year would be Ramadan! 🌟

If God’s servants knew what was held within “the month of Ramadan”…
they would wish for the whole year to be Ramadan!

This blessed month has “turned toward us”!
It has “turned toward us”!

We sat waiting to sight the new moon…
But before we looked for it, the blessed month had already sought us out!
It saw us!
It called us!
The servants of God!

What do blessing, mercy, and forgiveness add up to? 🕊

Do we know what the sum of “blessing,” “mercy,” and “forgiveness” is?
What, truly, is their sum?

When “blessing” is mingled with “God’s mercy,” and that, in turn, becomes one with a person’s soul through “God’s forgiveness”…
what a transformation it brings!
Where it can lead a person!

The blessed month of Ramadan has come to us!
It has come to welcome us!

With its “three embraces”…
✅ The embrace of blessing
✅ The embrace of mercy
✅ The embrace of forgiveness

The blessed month is God’s servants’ “greatest stroke of good fortune”!

Who could deny their good fortune
when they have the “blessed month of Ramadan” among them?

Everyone is fortunate!
Everyone is blessed with good luck!

Where are the treasure-seekers? 💎

Where are the treasure-seekers
who would discover the “greatness of the blessed month”?

What does this blessed month not contain that one could fail to find?

Every speck…
Every brick…
Every wall…
Every room…
Every chamber…
Every mansion…

Each and every one is a “rare and incomparable jewel”!

Its days… its nights… its hours… its moments…
Its sleep… its wakefulness… its every breath…

All of it is extraordinary!

This is the very “month” that has invited us to “God’s banquet”!

But what is a banquet, if not “blessing,” “mercy,” and “forgiveness”?
These are but God’s “appetizers” and “preliminary welcome”!
Before His main feast!

But what could “God’s blessing” possibly lack?
Doesn’t “God’s mercy” encompass everything?
Hasn’t whoever attains “God’s forgiveness” attained everything?

So what more could there be?
Beyond all this comes “God’s banquet”!

But who gets to sit at this table?
“Those who are of God’s generosity!”

Ramadan’s incomparable reward: why does God Himself give the reward? ✨

What is this “banquet” made of?
Or is it made of nothing at all?
It is incomparable!

For God Himself has said:
“I Myself will reward you!”

But aren’t all the rewards in this world from God?
Then why is the reward of the “blessed month” reserved for Him alone?

A secret lies hidden here!
A secret we will allude to…

If, in the blessed month, every breath we take is “praise of God”…
what will our heavenly state be like?

How will “love and devotion to God” shine forth?

Ramadan: the transformation of the human being into a land of remembrance and love 🌿

In this month, a person is suddenly transformed into a “land flourishing with remembrance”!
They reach the “realm of love”!

But what can we do to attain “the highest graces” and “God’s special banquet”?
How can we make sure we don’t fall short, and receive the full measure of its blessings?

How can we partake of “God’s entire table” all at once?

There is only one way:
“Take refuge in the Host Himself!”

We are guests of the “Host” who alone can make us “capable”!
He alone can enable us to partake of “all the blessings at His exalted table”!

The secret to receiving blessings from God’s table 🔑

Yes, that is the very “secret”!

“When I turned to God for help…”
✅ With sincere intentions…
✅ With pure hearts…

That is when God grants us success!

What is the sign of it?
✅ I become “anchored in God”!
✅ I attain “the fast of God”!
✅ I embrace the Qur’an!

And this is the clear sign that I have “succeeded”!

How beautifully the blessed month of Ramadan resembles the Qur’an!
It is the month of the Qur’an!

The truly faithful: those healed by Ramadan and the Qur’an 📖

Only the faithful benefit from this month!
Those who are truly believers!

Not those who merely “look like believers,” while their hearts are like the hearts of “hypocrites”!

The “truly faithful” are those healed by the Qur’an and the blessed month of Ramadan!
But the “wrongdoers” gain nothing from this month but loss!

The blessed month brings them nothing but loss!

Woe to those who are “heedless”!
And all the more so to those who are “abusive”!

This month has “turned toward us”!
And in turning toward us, “the whole universe” has revealed itself to us!
The “Glorious Word of God” has “shown itself to us”!

So may our “eternal greetings of peace” be upon “the blessed month of Ramadan”!
Upon its “Night of Decree”!
And upon the “Qur’an” revealed in this month!
And upon the “blessed being” through whom alone the Night of Decree and the month of Ramadan find their meaning!

Ramadan’s blood coursing through our veins 🩸

Indeed, the blessed month of Ramadan has arrived!
So that “Ramadan’s blood” may flow through our veins!

But what happens when “the blood of a pure person” is transfused into our veins?
Our whole state is transformed!

So when “the month of Ramadan,” in all “its majesty and grandeur,” flows through our souls…
How should we feel?

How should we fulfill “this month’s due”?

We must come to “know” it!
Without such knowledge, how can we journey along “the path to God’s pleasure”?

Ramadan: the month of seeking forgiveness, declaring God’s oneness, and affirming His unity 🌙

It is “God’s month”!
The “month of God”!
The “month of beauty”!
The “month of seeking forgiveness and declaring God’s oneness”!

In this month, we should say “There is no god but God” more than ever!
The “light of divine unity” should blaze from within us!

It is the “month of proclaiming God’s greatness”!
“God is the greatest مِنْ أنْ یُوصَف”!

It is the “month of glorifying and praising God”!
The “month of love”!
In this month, we should sing “the song of love for God”!

It is “the month of celebrating God’s glory and transcendence”!

The “springtime month of the poor”!
We should visit the poor!
We should show them kindness!

We should honor “the company of God’s blessings”!
We should be “good neighbors” to God’s blessings!

✅ Every “blessing from God” should be honored!
✅ God’s blessing of “knowledge”!
✅ God’s blessing of “jurisprudence”!
✅ God’s blessing of the “Qur’an”!
✅ God’s blessing of the “Prophet’s Household”!

We must be “grateful” for all these blessings!

Ramadan: the month of maintaining ties with our brothers and feeding the poor 🤝🍽

It is the “month of maintaining ties with our brothers”!
The “month of feeding the poor and needy”!
The “month of breaking the fast”!
The “month of providing iftar for those who fast”!
The “month of liberation”!

If we are not “set free” this month…
when will we taste “freedom”?

The incomparable secret of fasting and divine reward 🔑

“Fasting is for Me, and I Myself shall reward it!”

The harder I try to grasp what this means…
the more bewildered I become!

“Fasting” belongs exclusively to the “incomparable Essence of God”!
And its “reward” belongs exclusively to “His Essence”!

But what does that mean?
✅ Does it mean a “direct reward” unlike any other?
✅ Does it mean that “no one can guess” what the reward for fasting in the blessed month of Ramadan will be?

It is as though God has fashioned this “reward” so that “human beings” cannot comprehend it!
God’s direct will will utterly envelop the one who fasts!

Whoever lets go of “everything”…
will receive a reward unlike “anything” else!

✅ It is not of the same kind as blessings!
✅ It is not of the same kind as the Names!
✅ It is not of the same kind as the Attributes!

So who is the one who becomes a “fasting servant of God”?
Blessed is that “fasting servant of God” whose every limb, faculty and inward part is “fasting”!

It is as though this faster passes beyond every “veil”!
He reaches the “final station”!
He conquers the “summits of the Attributes”!
He apprehends “what lies beyond the Attributes”!

And then discovers what a “direct reward” tastes like!
Or perhaps it is not a “taste” at all!

The one who fasts is God’s special guest 🏆

Yes, “fasting” belongs to “Him”!
The “faster,” too, belongs to “Him”!
And the “reward” belongs to “Him” alone!

He will not accept any “servant” to attend to the one who fasts for Him!
“God Himself” will be the host!

And this is the very “secret” Imam Sajjad (AS) taught us!
It is the very “secret” we must “attain”!

Fasting: the death of the carnal self and the sovereignty of God 🏹

“Fasting” “kills” the “carnal self”!
It takes “rule” away from the “carnal self”!

“Fasting” lulls the “carnal self” “to sleep”!
It takes the “reins of command” from the self!

✅ It deposes that “self-proclaimed ruler”!
✅ It breaks the “self’s overbearing pride”!
✅ It tames “that rabid dog of the self”!

Indeed, “fasting” softens the “rebellious”!

Fasting: the death of the appetites of the lower nature and the awakening of the spiritual appetite ✨

“Fasting” “kills” the “desires of the lower nature”!
It takes “appetite” away from the “lower nature”!

Why should “human nature” give in to appetite, only for it to “drag us down into ruin”?

✅ We must follow the path of “servitude to God” with the “appetite of reason”!
✅ “Human nature” must stand behind “the qibla of reason”!
✅ So that it may “desire” what “God desires”!
✅ It should desire what “God” desires!
✅ “Appetite” should become a “spiritual appetite”!
✅ “Appetite” should become an “appetite for divine pleasure”!

Fasting: a clear heart and purified faculties 💎

“Fasting in the blessed month of Ramadan” brings “clarity” to the “heart”!
It fills “the human heart” with “light”!
It wipes away “its dust”!
It makes it “clear”!

It “washes” the “limbs and faculties”!
It makes them “pure” and “clean”!

✅ But “purifying the limbs and faculties” is a “key”!

Why does so much “impurity” come from the “human being”?
Human beings ought to make the “world of existence” fragrant!
So why do they themselves become “impure”?

Why do they recoil from “their own smell”?
Why does their outward form need washing?

Where does this “impurity” come from?
Let us set aside the “inner impurities” for now!

But “fasting” has come to “purify” the “limbs and faculties”!

By God, if they are “purified”…
no more “impurity” will come forth from the “human being”!

✅ The blessed month has come so that we may be rid of “impurities”!
✅ So that we may be “freed” from “all that is impure”!
✅ So that “light” may shine forth from the “human being”!
✅ So that “nectar,” sweeter even than honey, may flow from them!