Imam Al-Sadiq’s Supplication before reciting the Holy Quran

My best buddy gave me a present recently. It was a translation of the Holy Quran that his mother bought when she went on a tour to Iran. I would like to share the translation of the supplication that Imam Al-Sadiq makes before reciting the Holy Quran:

In the Name of Allah, the Beneficient, the Merciful

O God, I implore to You to be the Witness on my declaration that this is Your scripture revealed by You to Your Apostle, Muhammad ibn Abdullah, may God bless him and his Household, that is Your speech, pronounced on the tongue of Your Prophet, whom You made Your guide for Your creatures and a tie between Yourself and Your servants.

O God, what I open is Your testament and Your epistle. O God, hallow my act of looking into it, and make my reading of it and act of contemplation, and make my contemplation therein educative. O God, make me one of those who take lesson from Your counsels and refrain from disobeying You. Do not close my inner ear as I read it, nor draw a curtain over my inner eyes. Let not my reading be one that is devoid of contemplation. Make me one who contemplates over its signs and prescriptions and follows the laws of Your religion. Let me not be negligent as I study it, nor let my recitation of it be mere babbling. Indeed, You are the Most Gracious and the Most Merciful.

Ameen.

Dear God….

Dear God, what have I become? For months I have asked myself why…why have I become numb that I am incapable of feeling love? Is this my justice? Is this my punishment?

Dear God, I can hardly cry…I cannot shed a tear the way I used to be able to, to relieve myself of my sorrow. I feel the stress, I feel the sadness growing like a diseased tumour in me, yet I am unable to cry. Instead I feel that my heart has become almost as cold as steel, tampered by my unending trials and tribulations.

Dear God, I bear witness that the trials that I am experiencing are your trials and I am being tested for reasons beyond my comprehension. I can only ask that I be given the patience and the means to see through my trials. At the same time, I have my fears and I pray for comfort, my Lord. You are my Comforter. I have lost the affections of people around me, those who once profess love for me. Please do not forsake me and deprive me of your blessings and love. My Lord, forgive me for my sins and transgressions against you and please allow me to seek redemption. You have given me the steely determination to see me through my trials and I thank you for that gift but I seem to have lost the ability to love.

Dear God, I am typing this after my prayers for I seemingly cannot say anything without feeling but I can feel what I write. So I hope that you would not mind me doing this.

I hope that my small request for you to bequeath love and affection back into my heart is not too much for me to ask.

Before I end, once again in Allah’s name I seek forgiveness, redemption, comfort and protection. There is no God worthy of worship but Allah and Muhammad s.a.w is His messenger. To those, I bear witness.