Prophetic Prayers

Many traditions have been recorded in the books of hadith, which tell us that the Prophet used to recite certain words of prayer at certain times. These words are generally known as masnun dhikr, or masnun dua. Generally, it is believed that these words recited by the Prophet are the greatest source of tazkiyah, and that one should learn them and keep reciting them on certain occasions in order to achieve the ends of tazkiyah.

However, this is not true. These words uttered by the Prophet are in actual fact a reflection of the feelings or states of mind of the Prophet. The truth is that the Prophet of Islam, because of his high levels of realization, used to be constantly preoccupied by thoughts of God. On different occasions this inner feeling found expression in words. Today, those who study books of Hadith only know the words of the Prophet: they stop short of knowing his feelings or states of mind. This is why they take the words to be all in all. Subscribing to this concept of prophetic prayers is to underestimate the words of the Prophet.

In its reality, prophetic prayer is meant to awaken one’s consciousness. Then it is only through the continual thinking process thus initiated that we may develop such a personality as lives in thoughts of God. This is, as it were, the first prerequisite for learning from the prayers of the Prophet. After this the words of prayer uttered by him will be of great importance so far as the development of a spiritual personality is concerned. Without this preparation, repeating the words of the Prophet, rather than following the words of the Prophet in the real sense, is nothing but empty repetition.

People, consciously or unconsciously, regard the prayers of the Prophet as having been couched in sacred words, which possess mysterious qualities. But this is not true. The truth is that the prayers of the Prophet tell us of the states of the Prophet, rather than being just words in the simple sense.