Peak of Eloquence Nahjul Balagha By Imam Ali ibn Abu Talib - English Translation - Sermon 159

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Praise of Allah

Allah’s verdict is judicious and full of wisdom. His Pleasure implies protection and mercy. He decides with knowledge and forgives with forbearance.

O Lord! Praise to You for what You take and give, and for that from which You cure or with which You afflict. I praise You in away which is the most acceptable to You, the most liked by You and the most dignified before You, praise which fills all Your creation and reaches where You desires, praise which is not veiled from You and does not end and whose continuity does not cease.

Greatness of Allah

We do not know the reality of Your greatness except that we know that you are Ever-living and Self-subsisting, the One by Whom all things subsist. Drowsiness or sleep do not overtake You; vision does not reach You and sight does not grasp You. You see the eyes and counts the ages. You hold (people as slaves) by their forelocks and feet. We see Your creation and contemplate on it because of Your might and describe it as (a result of) Your great authority, whereas what is hidden from us, of which our sight has fallen short, which our intelligence has not attained and between which and ourselves curtains of the unknown have been cast, is far greater.

He who frees his heart (from all other engagements) and exerts his thinking in order to know how You established Your throne, how You created Your creatures, how You suspended the air in Your skies and how You spread Your earth on the waves of water... his eyes will return tired, his intelligence defeated, his ears eager and his thinking wandering.

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Part of the Same Sermon about Hope and Fear in Allah

One claims, according to his own thinking, that he sets his hopes on Allah. By Allah, the Great One, he speaks a lie. His status is that his hope (in Allah) does not appear through his action, although the hope of everyone who hopes is known through his own action. Every hope is so, except the hope in Allah, the Sublime, if it is impure. Every fear is established except the fear for Allah, if it is unreal.

He hopes big things from Allah and small things from men, but he gives to man (such consideration as) he does not give to Allah. What does he think is the matter with Allah, glorified be His praise?! He is accorded less (consideration) than what is accorded to His creatures. Do you ever fear to be false in your hope in Allah? Or do you not regard Him as the center of your hope? Similarly, if a man fears another man, he gives him (such consideration) out of his fear which he does not give to Allah. Thus, he has made his fear for men ready currency, while his fear of the Creator is mere deferment or promise. This is the case of everyone in whose eye this world appears big (and important) and in whose heart its status is great. He prefers it over Allah, so he inclines towards it and becomes its devotee.

The Example of the Holy Prophet (h)

Certainly in the Prophet of Allah (h) was a perfect example for

you and a proof concerning the vices of this world, its defects, themultitude of its disgraces and evils. Because its sides had been constrained for him, while its flanks had been spread for others, he was deprived of its milk and turned away from its adornments.

The Example of Musa (Moses)

If you want, I will, as a second example, relate to you concerning Musa, the Interlocutor of Allah (x), when he said, “O Allah! I am in need

of whatever good You may grant me” (Holy Quran, 28: 24). By Allah, he asked Him only for bread to eat because he was used to eating the herbs of the earth, so much so that the greenness of the herbs could be seen from the delicate skin of his belly due to his thinness and the paucity of his flesh.