Prayer that Can Change Destiny

According to a hadith: ‘Only dua can change God’s decision’. (Sunan al-Tirmidhi, Hadith No. 2139) God has established the system of this world on the basis of cause and effect, and then God has given human beings total freedom. Now a person acts as he pleases and the good or evil results ensue either in agreement with or in opposition to the system of cause and effect set up by God. My belief is that this system is absolute.. For no one can the system be set at naught.

In this matter, the only exception is that of dua, or sincere prayer. When a person prays to God and given that God grants his prayer, then at that time God intervenes in the system of cause and effect and paves the way for a person according to his prayer to Him. This means that dua changes God’s decision (qaza wa qadar).

But dua is not just the repetition of certain words. Even if these prayers consist of verses from the Quran or from the traditions learnt by rote, it cannot be effective. To change the system of predetermination (qaza) such dua is required as comes straight from the heart, in which the entire existence of an individual is involved, and his whole personality is shaken to the core.

Another condition for the acceptance of this kind of dua is that the one who is praying has so purified himself intellectually that his thinking has risen to the same plane as divine thinking. Such a person will ask God for only that which is acceptable to Him. He will not say such prayers to God as are not in accordance with the way of God.