اللَّهُمَّ إِنِّي أَسْألُكَ بِرَحْمَتِكَ الَّتِي وَسِعَتْ كُلَّ شَيٍْء
O Allah! I ask you by your Mercy that envelops everything,
Each of the words in this phrase has secret implications, which are presented here.
“اللهم”: is derived from “يا الله” (O Allah); “يا” (O) is omitted and instead, “ميم” is added at the end. This shows that as the Almighty Allah preceded everything in existence, His holy name should precede everything else as well. The supplicant who calls Allah should know that if He had not inclined and permitted, the servant could not utter a single word to praise and ask Allah. The supplicant’s tongue can call Allah only by His strength and Mercy. In fact, as du`¡’ itself is the teaching of Allah, the servant’s utterance of supplication and the acceptance of it are only by Allah’s will too.
“اني اسالك” (I ask you): “اني” means “I”, but it does not mean egoism here. As a matter of fact, “I” in this phrase and throughout the holy Kumayl du`¡’ implies not an independent being, but a servant in need. The supplicant in such a state sees himself as a deprived servant who calls Allah with humility, and perceives Allah as the source of Mercy, Justice, and Forgiveness. That’s why the supplicant asks his demand humbly from the All-Compassionate God.
“برحمتك التي وسعت كل شيئ” (by your Mercy that envelops everything): Allah’s mercy envelops everything, and surrounds the apparent and hidden facets of beings. This embracing Mercy is Allah’s general blessing, by which He brought all the creatures into existence, placed them in their appropriate positions and depending on the creatures’ capacity and faculty, provided them generously with the necessary means to material growth and spiritual development.
In the valuable book, an¢s allayl, we read the following:
Allah’s general Mercy is like the sun; it rises from east, and shines to everything within its beam, not depriving anything from its light, out of stinginess. All the creatures within the sunbeam benefit from the sun to the extent of their capability.
In the same way, all the visible and hidden beings from the largest to the smallest enjoy Allah’s common blessings. Even the smallest creatures, which are not observable via the most developed microscopes, are included in Allah’s realm, and each benefits from His Mercy to the extent possible in order to grow and reach material and spiritual perfection. From the heavens to the earth, from east to west, and from the unseen to the visible, all beings benefit from Allah, the Creator and the Provider. They are not detached from this source of Divine Mercy even for a moment, since if this happens, they will not exist anymore.
The creation of existing beings and giving sustenance to them, the growing of plants, the development of objects, the revelation of signs and miracles, the appointment of prophets, the guidance of the misled, the living of creatures, the descent of the angels, the recreation of the dead, the recompense to the believers, the chastisement of the wrongdoers, the establishment of the Resurrection Day, the heaven and the Hell, the forgiveness of believers’ sins, and every goodness present in the world, are all instances of Allah’s embracing Mercy. Allah’s Magnanimous Mercy is not perceptible by our limited knowledge and partial understanding.
Counting “كل شيء”, or all the living and inanimate beings who are within the realm of Allah’s blessings is not possible. Even if all the angels, jinns and humans become authors, using all the trees on the earth as pens and all the seas as ink, they cannot count but a few of Allah’s creatures.
To get a small amount of God’s blessings toward his creatures, it is necessary to study a few cases of these beings, so that we can absorb some rays of Allah’s knowledge.
The Living World
The measurement of the world with regard to its length, width, capacity, and the number of beings existing inside it is totally impractical. Yet a corner of this excellent creation of God, namely the planet on which human beings reside and benefit from the blessings of its sky and earth, is discernible via our senses and experiences.
Everything in this world, from microscopic germs and viruses less than “thousandth millimeters” to the galaxies and stars at the distance of millions of kilometers, are made of atoms. Atoms are so minute that they are not visible via the strongest microscopes. There are 55 million million atoms at the point of a needle. If we magnify the point of the needle as a gigantic building, each atom will become as a fly creeping on one of the pillars.
By God’s Mercy, atom is composed of three basic particles, i.e. electron, proton, and neutron, which have negative, positive, and neutral electric charges respectively. Protons and neutrons form the atom core together, around which the electrons turn along an axis, just as the moon turns around the earth orbit.[1] Countless atoms are the building blocks of this world. No one knows how the material and building blocks of the world was formed, and how they were created, but the Almighty God:
مَا أَشْهَدْتُهُمْ خَلْقَ السَّمَاوَاتِ وَالأَرْضِ وَلا خَلْقَ أَنفُسِهِمْ.
I made them not witness the creation of the heavens and the earth, not their own creation. (18:51)
What is stated in the Holy Qur’¡n and most great scientists have proven after lengthy studies is that: the building blocks for creation of the world were gas and smoke particles wandering in the space, which were so scattered that they hardly ever crossed each other.
ثُمَّ اسْتَوَى إِلَى السَّمَاءِ وَهِيَ دُخَانٌ.
Then turned He to the heaven when it was smoke (41:11)
Then Allah created the stars, decorating the lowest heaven that is the nearest one to us, by combining millions of gas particles into huge clouds; the cloud masses absorbed the particles toward the center to form bigger clouds, the particles collided with each other and produced heat, and sometimes the heat increased and a lightening occurred at the cloud center, illuminating the dark space. Finally millions of cloud masses formed the stars and from then on light appeared in the world and our sky was adorned with the stars.
A shapeless cloud was spread throughout the massive space. Particles of different substances crashed and combined; the cloud revolved around like a turbulent ocean, full of invisible huge waves. Within this turbulent ocean, the movement of materials formed a spiral diagram, which was extended at the center with two developing arms. The solar system is located in one of the arms of the spiral diagram, called the Milky Way.
By God’s Will and Mercy, the sun and the solar system were created; there happened a chaotic storm in one of the arms and the motion of gasses moved the clouds too, to form a giant gig with illuminating particles around it. The giant gig moved on and absorbed the gasses toward the center, until an enormous shining ball was created in the form of the sun:
وَجَعَلَ الْقَمَرَ فِيهِنَّ نُورًا وَجَعَلَ الشَّمْسَ سِرَاجًا.
And hath made the moon a light therein, and made the sun a lamp. (71:16)
Then the gas particles, which had previously surrounded the sun, scattered and formed several masses, which turned around the sun on separate orbits; some near the sun and some far from it. There was heat in the masses near the sun and cold in the distance.
In each mass of gas and dust, the particles moved constantly; some gas particles produced steam, which changed to liquid whose humidity joined the dust particles together to form iced mud. Millions of these particles were moving inside the masses. Gravity pulled the particles together to form large balls, which further absorbed the particles and got bigger. One of these balls emerged as the earth, by Allah’s Will. Then other planets were created at the heart of masses of gas, each rotating around the sun in a certain orbit. The nearest planet to the sun was Mercury, and after that there were Venus, earth and Mars. Beyond Mars, the giant planets Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune were rotating around the sun, and at the very distance, there was the Pluto planet.[2]
Just as the smallness of atoms is beyond human understanding, so is the hugeness of the world. Light has an incredible rapid speed of 300 thousand kilometers per second; however, the light of the nearest star reaches the earth only after four years.
The telescope at the Palumar Mountain, California, has a five-meter-diameter mirror, and it can trace some stars in the space whose light reach the earth after a thousand million years! The stars that are now observable via the modern telescopes are so numerous that if we count them for 100 years, counting one star in each second, there will be stars uncounted after this period![3] A galaxy is a gigantic core, which is wider at the center, including at least a thousand million stars. Its length is a hundred thousand light years and its width at the center is about twenty thousand light years. As today’s human telescopes can observe, there are probably a hundred and fifty million galaxies in the world, and the average distance between two neighboring galaxies is two million light years.[4]
This great system is only a corner of the living world, which is observed by man’s limited knowledge. Only Allah is aware of the whole world that is out of the reach of human being. As the Commander of the Believers (a.s) insightfully has stated: Creation is within Allah’s Mercy; the Mercy that established and developed the world.
Human; the Noblest Inhabitant of the World
Having created the world, providing the necessary equipment and sustenance, the Omnipotent willed to create a notable being, composed of body, soul, mind, heart and temper, out of Mercy. He placed man as His vicegerent on earth, to grow and gain strength by the blessings He has supplied; to live in accord with the guidance of prophets and their books, and to worship the Creator and serve His fellow creatures. The man then is transferred to the Hereafter by death, and is granted his recompense in the eternal paradise, remaining in Allah’s Mercy forever. Here we review the signs of Allah’s Mercy embracing human apparent and interior sides.
Different Stages in the Creation of Man
The holy Qur’¡n has considered the creation of human fetus as happening in stages:
وَقَدْ خَلَقَكُمْ أَطْوَارًا.
When He created you by (diverse) stages? (71:14)
The first Stage: Soil
وَلَقَدْ خَلَقْنَا الإِنسَانَ مِنْ سُلالَةٍ مِنْ طِينٍ.
We created man of an extraction of clay. (23:12)
The human embryo is the product of various foods, coming from animals and plants. The plants feed the animals and are fed by the soil. As a result, human embryo is made from the earth. The latest scientific findings show that the chemical elements found in earth, such as iron, copper, calcium, iodine, etc. exist in human body. Humans constantly obtain the extracts of chemicals present in the earth by feeding from animals and plants, and reproduce.
The Second Stage: Water
وَهُوَ الَّذِي خَلَقَ مِنْ الْمَاءِ بَشَرًا.
And He it is Who created man from water… (25:54)
To biologists, human body resembles a sponge soaked in water. The body of a seventy-kilogram person is composed of fifty liters of water, and this ratio is fixed for all people. If a person loses twenty percent of his body water, he will not recover again.
The water inside human cells includes a large amount of potassium, and totally lacks salt. The water outside the cells, on the other hand, has much salt. The composition of water outside the cells is exactly the same as that of the water in which the first living beings resided millions of years ago. Later on, when the water beings came to the land, they practically carried away the water they lived in, since they could not continue life without it. This is the miracle of Qur’¡n which fourteen decades ago, in an illiterate desert society without scientific tools, stated:” It is He who created man from water.”
The Third Stage: Alaq
خَلَقَ الإِنسَانَ مِنْ عَلَقٍ.
He Createth man from a clot. (96:2)
“Alaq” lexically means a worm or leech that sticks to the womb. Spermatozoids are now observable by microscope and are seen as a plethora of floating leeches, which stick to the womb.
The amount of spermatozoid is about four cubic centimeters, in each centimeter of which there are one hundred to two hundred million leech-like beings. They move toward Ovule, the female cell, together.
The ovary of a young woman contains about three million unripe ovums, four hundred of which get ripe. During menstruation, the bag containing the ovums is cracked, and the ovums go through a pipe that connects the ovary to the womb. The movement of the pipe’s trembling lashes facilitates the transfer of the ovums to the womb.
The fourth Stage: Creation from a Despised Fluid
ثُمَّ جَعَلَ نَسْلَهُ مِنْ سُلَالَةٍ مِنْ مَاءٍ مَهِينٍ.
Then He made his progeny from a draught of despised fluid. (32:8)
When the leech-like sperms floating in the male semen reach the womb they suddenly start a strange competition. The two hundred million sperms engaging in this competition rush toward the ovum and they soon surround it. Seen under microscope, the sperms whose tails move resemble a meadow that waves with the breeze. Each sperm tries to be the first to enter the ovum. As soon as one of them succeeds in doing so, its tail is cut and the entrance spot becomes inflamed. The ovum’s protoplasm gets contracted and emits a liquid to keep other sperms away from entering it. Consequently, from among two hundred million male sperms, only one mingles with the female ovum and thus human is created. Sometimes, by Allah’s will, two or more sperms enter the ovum and then a twin fetus is produced in the woman womb.
The Fifth Stage: Amshaj (the Zygote)
إِنَّا خَلَقْنَا الإِنسَانَ مِنْ نُطْفَةٍ أَمْشَاجٍ.
Verily We created Man from a drop of mingled sperm… (76:2)
To create a human being, an ovum (a white seed) should catch a sperm, which is two hundred and fifty times smaller than the ovum. Then the chromosomes of the sperm, which have been divided by half, mingle with the chromosomes of the ovum and generate a new being; the zygote, which Qur’¡n calls amshaj (mingled).
The ovum and the sperm cannot continue life even in the best conditions and they soon die, except that they mingle together and produce the zygote. After this process, the zygote begins dividing; first it is divided into two, then becomes four, eight, etc. and finally makes a cell mass.
The Sixth Stage: the Shaping of the Fetus
هُوَ اللَّهُ الْخَالِقُ الْبَارِئُ الْمُصَوِّرُ لَهُ الأَسْمَاءُ الْحُسْنَى.
He is Allah the Creator the Evolver the Bestower of Forms. To Him belong the Most Beautiful Names. (59:24)
After the completion of cells, which are the building blocks for the fetus, a large mass of cells is placed in the womb to start growing the fetus.
First, under the light of Allah’s Mercy, these countless cells separate from each other to shape various organs; the cells of brain, eye, ear, etc. chase their fellow-cells to develop the different body parts, this way the fetus body is shaped by the cells.
The small ball on the left of the fetus is its nutrition source. This ball, floating in blood, obtains from blood the extract of food, water, and oxygen provided by the digestion and respiratory systems, and transfers them to the fetus through navel. This is Allah’s Mercy that embraces everything and the signs of it are brighter than sun in every molecule of His creation.
The Seventh Stage: Placing the fetus in Three Veils
يَخْلُقُكُمْ فِي بُطُونِ أُمَّهَاتِكُمْ خَلْقًا مِنْ بَعْدِ خَلْقٍ فِي ظُلُمَاتٍ ثَلاثٍ.
…He makes you in the wombs of your mothers in stages one after another in three veils of darkness… (39:6)
Three veils gradually embrace the fetus; the amnion veil, the chorion veil, and the allantoids veil. The amnion is a veil generated by the growing of fetus outer surface. It expands until it makes a space called the amnion cavity behind the fetus in which there is a pure fluid.
The Chorion veil is out of the amnion veil and helps protect the fetus.
The allantoids veil is before the fetus belly and is responsible for digestion and absorption of food. These three veils save the fetus from the air, light, water, wind, and possible strikes. In the space between the amnion veil and the fetus, there is a fluid. When a strike is made to the womb, it is transferred to this liquid and becomes neutral in it. This is Allah’s Mercy toward the human fetus.
The Eighth Stage: Breathing Spirit
ثُمَّ أَنشَأْنَاهُ خَلْقًا آخَرَ.
… and then produced it another creation. So blessed be Allah, the Best of Creators! (23:14)
Having accomplished the shaping of the fetus, which is the sign of Allah’s Power and many facts about which are still unknown, Allah breathes spirit into the fetus that is a sophisticated process in itself. He wills to miraculously transform the fetus, breathe His spirit into it, and make it alive. This is the time when the fetus learns to put its finger inside the mouth. That’s why the newly born can feed from his/her mother’s breast immediately after birth.
The Ninth Stage: Birth
وَاللَّهُ أَخْرَجَكُمْ مِنْ بُطُونِ أُمَّهَاتِكُمْ.
It is He who brought you forth from the wombs of your mothers… (16:78)
The story of childbirth is one of the most fascinating processes occurring in the creation system. The fetus that have lived in the dark, quiet and pleasantly warm womb for nine months, now, by Allah’s Mercy, enters an atmosphere quite different from the previous one. Allah has granted it all capabilities to cope with the new environment. The child leaves the mother womb with a temperature of 37 degrees centigrade and enters another milieu with a more or less temperature, but it copes with the new setting. This survival is still a mystery in medicine. The child goes from darkness to the light and its delicate eyes tolerate the dazzling light of the outside world. It comes from a wet place to a dry one, but it immediately copes with the new situation. As a fetus, it was fed through the navel, and now it eats through the mouth and breathes the air with no mediator![5]
These are all signs of Allah’s unlimited Mercy and human being should hence be grateful of His blessings wholeheartedly and call out:
