Introductory Note

About The Author

Introduction

First Hadith: Jihad of The Self

Second Hadith: Ostentation (Riya’)

Third Hadith: Self-Conceit (‘Ujb)

Fourth Hadith: Pride (Kibr)

Fifth Hadith: Envy (Hasad)

Sixth Hadith: Love Of The World

Seventh Hadith: Anger (Ghadhab)

Eighth Hadith:  Prejudice (‘Asabiyyah)

Ninth Hadith: Hypocrisy (Nifaq)

Tenth Hadith: Desire And Hope

Eleventh Hadith: Man’s God-Seeking Nature

Twelfth Hadith: Contemplation (Tafakkur)

Thirteenth Hadith: Trust In God (Tawakkul)

Fourteenth Hadith: Fear of God

Fifteenth Hadith: The Believer’s Trials And Tribulations

Sixteenth Hadith: Patience (Sabr)

Seventeenth Hadith: Repentance (Tawbah)

Eighteenth Hadith: Remembrance Of God

Nineteenth Hadith: Backbiting (Ghibah)

Twentieth Hadith: Pure Intention (Ikhlas)

Twenty-First Hadith: Thankfulness (Shukr)

Twenty-Second Hadith: The Aversion For Death

Twenty-Third Hadith: The Seekers Of Knowledge

Twenty Fourth Hadith: The Classification Of Sciences

Twenty-Fifth Hadith: Satanic Insinuation

Twenty Sixth Hadith: The Pursuit Of Knowledge

Twenty-Seventh Hadith: Prayer And Concentration

Twenty-Eighth Hadith: Meeting God

Twenty-Ninth Hadith: The Prophet’s Counsel To ‘Ali

Thirtieth Hadith: The Kinds of Hearts

Thirty-First Hadith: The Indescribability of God, The Prophet, And The Imams

Thirty-Second Hadith:  Conviction In Faith

Thirty-Third Hadith: Wilayah And Works

Thirty-Fourth Hadith: The Station of The Faithful Before God

Thirty-Fifth Hadith:  God And Man, Good And Evil

Thirty-Sixth Hadith: The Attributes Of God

Thirty-Seventh Hadith: The Knowledge Of God

Thirty-Eighth Hadith: The Meaning Of God’s Creation Of Adam In His Image

Thirty-Ninth Hadith: Good And Evil

Fortieth Hadith: Exegesis of Surat Al-Tawhid and Some Verses of Surat Al-Hadid

Prayer and Epilogue

Detailed commentary on 40 selected traditions narrated through the
Prophet (S) and his Ahl al-Bayt (a) on topics of ethics and
spirituality, including jihad al-nafs. Second revised edition.


Forty Hadith, An Exposition

Prayer and Epilogue
===================

O God, Who have illuminated the hearts of the *awliya*’ with the light
of love and cleared the tongues of the lovers of Thy beauty from the
taints of egoism, and have placed Thy majesty beyond the reach of
self-seeking wretches!

Awaken us from the intoxication of worldly delusion and deliver us from
the heavy slumber of nature, and remove with ‘My gesture the thick
curtains and obstructing veils of egotism and self-seeking. Let us into
the assembly of the holy ones of Thy threshold and into the holy company
of the sincere God-seekers. Remove from us these devilish, ugly, and
coarse qualities of ours and our pretensions and waywardness. Inform
with sincerity and love our movements and pauses, our actions and works,
our beginning and end, and our outward and inward being.

O God! Your blessings are given without prior deservedness (Worthiness
is not a condition for the Lord’s gifts)[^1] and Your gifts are
unlimited. The door of Your mercy and favor is wide open and the table
of Your boundless bounties is spread out. Give us a fervent heart and an
arduous passion, a woeful heart and a tearful eye, a restless and
impassioned mind and a breathless and fiery breast. Let the end of our
live be in a state of sincere devotion to You and with the love of the
elect of Your threshold, that is, those who represent the prologue of
the book of being and the epilogue of the scrolls of the manifest and
the Hidden, Muhammad and his immaculate kindred and progeny, may God’s
blessings be upon all of them

And to God belongs all Praise, firstly and lastly, outwardly and
inwardly.

Concluded by the mortal hand of this indigent writer on Friday afternoon
of the fourth of the month of Muharram al-*Haram* of the year 1358 H.
[1939], and in God is my reliance and trust, at every commencement and
conclusion.

[^1]: This is a reference to the following couplet from Rumi’s Mathnawi
(daftar 5, bayt 1537). چاره آن دل عطاري مبدليست داد اورا قابليت شرط نيست


