Claims and Teachings - Ahmad The Promised Messiah and Mahdi — Page 302
302 It would have been much better if they had urged their entrea- ties to God while performing their prayers, for in that case they would have found delight and perfect joy in their prayers^ I therefore say that, for a time, you should give up the habit of lifting up your hands after your prayers are finished and ask of your Divine Master whatever you^ have to ask while you are praying) so that you may find bliss in your prayers. You should moreover submit your petitions to God in your own language, for in that case there would be greater fervor and enthusiasm in your supplications. So after you have recited the Holy Quran and the forms of prayer reported from the Holy Prophet, pray to God in your mother-tongue, for your supplications to God are best and most ardently expressed in that language. What is of essential importance for you to ask of God is that you may be delivered from sins and that God may be pleased with you, for with sins the heart is hardened and the sinful man is really an earthworm. Therefore our constant prayer to God who holds all power in His hands, should be that he may release us from sins and show us the path of His pleasure. The true believer lives in this world as if he were a traveller on horse- back going in a forest and stopping for a while to take rest un- der a. tree without alighting from the horse, and continuing the journey when relieved a little. But if a traveller were to make a permanent abode in that forest, he must soon be torn by beasts of prey. The true believer does not consider the world to be his borne, and for him who does so, God does not care, for He only loves and honors His faithful servants. It reported from the Holy Prophet that the true believer seeks the nearness of God by J* Jy by which are meant, deeds beyond what is in- cumbent or obligatory upon a person. The man of world slack- ens his pace after doing-a little bit of :good, but the true believer