Istisqaa (prayer for rain)
Oh Allah, I ask for your forgiveness (repeated nine times). Oh Allah! The Living,
The Self-subsisting, The Eternal, I ask for your forgiveness and I turn repentant unto you.
All due praise to Allah, The All Rich, The All Glorious, The Absolute, does whatever
He pleases Him and controls whatever He wants. “
He is the One that sends down rain (even) after (men) have given up all hope and scatters His Mercy (far and wide). And He is the Protector Worthy Of all Praise.
” (Ashura: 28). I praise Allah as is befitting to His generosity and thank Him for His limitless grace. I bear witness that there is no deity but Allah Alone, Who has no Associate.
By His mercy rains fall; by His will rivers flow and seas roll, and by His grace the day and night declare praise and glory. I also bear witness that our Master
Muhammad is Allah's Messenger and dearest servant, the envoy of mercy and the emblem of wisdom.
We ask Allah, the most gracious, to grant His blessings upon our Master
Muhammad (pbuh), the bearer of Allah's noble message, his family, his companions and all those who will follow them in righteousness until the Day of Judgment.
O Servants of Allah!
I urge you and myself to be ever God-conscious and to construct your lives in the shadow of divine obedience for Allah, the Almighty, says, “ O ye who believe! Fear
Allah, and let every soul look to what (provision) He has sent forth for the morrow. Yea, fear Allah. for Allah is well-acquainted with (all) that ye do .” (Al
Hashr: 18).
Dear Believers,
Water is one of the greatest divine blessings, one that makes every living creature.
Allah, The Most High, says, “
We made out of water every living thing. Will they not, then, begin to believe?
” (Al Anbiyaa: 30)
Allah has made water available in rivers, some out of springs and wells, and other by
His mercy falls as rain. Allah, the Almighty and Glorious is He, says, “ Seest thou not that Allah makes the clouds move gently, then joins them together, then makes them into a heap?― then wilt thou see rain issue forth from their midst.
And He sends down from the sky mountain masses (of clouds) wherein is hail:
He strikes therewith whom He pleases and He turns it away from whom He pleases. The vivid flash of its lightning well-nigh blinds the sight.
” (Annoor: 43).
Allah, the Greatest, sends the rain to whom He wishes of His servants, and likewise prevents it from whom He wants. By doing this, Allah, the Most High, conveys a
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message: His servants should seek his repentance and forgiveness, for the Almighty informs us: “ And O my people! Ask forgiveness of your Lord and then repent to
Him, He will send you (from the sky) abundant rain, and add strength to your strength, so do not turn away as Mujrimun (criminals, disbelievers in the
Oneness of Allah).
” (Hud: 52).
Yet water may be withdrawn because of people committing sins. Prophet Musa
(Moses) (pbuh) prayed once for water for the sake of his people, but rain did not come because there was a wrongdoer amongst them. When he asked Allah for the reason, he was told that there was one person causing the rain not to fall. Then Musa addressed his community and asked the unknown sinner amongst them to leave so as not to continue depriving the people from water. The person in concern, out of fear of being exposed, asked Allah’s forgiveness. As he was genuine in his repentance the rain fell immediately.
Intrigued, Musa wanted to know who was the wrongdoer, but Allah told him, “I had concealed his misdeeds while he was sinner, and how would I expose him now while he repents.”
As such, We need to turn to Allah to supplicate to him and praise him. We also need to be generous and give charity because it can greatly help in bringing rain. Abu
Huraira reported on Prophet Muhammad (pbuh) as saying: “While a person was in the wilderness he heard a voice from the cloud (commanding it thus): Irrigate the garden of so and so. (After that the clouds slinked aside and poured water on a stony ground. It filled a channel amongst the channels of that land and that person followed that water and he found a person standing in the garden busy in changing the course of water with the help of a hatchet.
He said to him: Servant of Allah, what is your name? he said: So and so. And it was that very name which he had heard from the clouds. and he said to him: Servant of
Allah, why do you ask me my name? He said: I heard a voice from the clouds of which It is the downpour, saying: Water the garden of so and to. like your name.
What do you do (for the favour) shown to you by Allah in this matter? He said: Now as you state so. I look what yield I get from it and I give one−third as charity out of it and I and my children eat one−third of it and one−third I return to it as investment.”
Dear Muslims,
Truly, being on the right path and consistently indulging in acts of worship lead to
Allah’s reward and mercy, for The Almighty says, “
If they (non-Muslims) had believed in Allah, and went on the Right Way (i.e. Islam) We should surely have bestowed on them water (rain) in abundance .” (Al Jinn: 16).
We therefore have to observe Salat (prayer) at its times as enjoined upon us by Allah, the Most High, and give Zakat when due. We have also to fulfil promises and people’s rights, and be pious and obedient to Allah, the Most Exalted for He says,
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“
And ordain for us that which is good, in this life and in the Hereafter: for we have turned unto Thee." He said: " My mercy extendeth to all things. That
(mercy) I shall ordain for those who do right, and practise regular charity, and those who believe in Our signs.
” (Al Aaraf: 156). Allah, the Almighty, also says in the same Sura “ If the people of the towns had but believed and feared Allah, We should indeed have opened out to them (All kinds of) blessings from heaven and earth; but they rejected (the truth), and We brought them to book for their misdeeds.
” (96)
Dear Muslims,
We need to relentlessly seek forgiveness because it is a cause of the descent of rain and the engineering of land. Allah, the Almighty and Glorious is He, says, “ I said (to them): 'Ask forgiveness from your Lord; Verily, He is Oft-Forgiving; 'He will send rain to you in abundance; 'And give you increase in wealth and children, and bestow on you gardens and bestow on you rivers .'” (Nuh: 10-12).
We ask Allah to guide us to be among His pious servants, those who repent and ask forgiveness and mercy and are rewarded by His blessing , rain.
May Allah help us all to obey Him and those He ordained us to obey, as the Almighty says: " O ye who believe! Obey Allah, and obey the Messenger, and those charged with authority among you ." (An-Nisa:59). May Allah bless you and me with the ability to implement the Holy Quran and the Sunna of His Messenger Muhammad
(pbuh). I say this and ask Allah, the Almighty, to grant us forgiveness. Supplicate to
Allah for forgiveness for He is the Most Forgiving and the Most Merciful.
Second sermon
Oh Allah, I ask for your forgiveness (repeated nine times). Oh Allah! The Living,
The Self-subsisting, The Eternal, I ask for your forgiveness and I turn repentant unto you.
All praise is due to Allah, The Most Gracious. We ask Him to grant His blessings upon His Prophet Muhammad (pbuh), his family, his companions and all those who will follow them in righteousness.
Dear Believers,
Our Prophet (pbuh) taught us to resort to Allah, The Most Gracious, at times of drought to pray for rain. Narrated by Anas bin Malik: Once in the lifetime of the
Prophet (pbuh) the people were afflicted with drought (famine). While the Prophet was delivering the Khutba on a Friday, a Bedouin stood up and said, "O, Allah's
Apostle! Our possessions are being destroyed and the children are hungry; Please invoke Allah (for rain)".
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So the Prophet raised his hands. At that time there was not a trace of cloud in the sky.
By Him in Whose Hands my soul is as soon as he lowered his hands, clouds gathered like mountains, and before he got down from the pulpit, I saw the rain falling on the beard of the Prophet. It rained that day, the next day, the third day, the fourth day till the next Friday.
The same Bedouin or another man stood up and said, "O Allah's Apostle! The houses have collapsed, our possessions and livestock have been drowned; Please invoke
Allah (to protect us)". So the Prophet raised both his hands and said, "O Allah!
Round about us and not on us". So, in whatever direction he pointed with his hands, the clouds dispersed and cleared away, and Medina's sky became clear as a hole in between the clouds. The valley of Qanat remained flooded, for one month, none came from outside but talked about the abundant rain.”
O Allah, We pray to You to fulfill our wish and not to repel our supplications to You.
You, Who has the pride and glory, The Compassionate, The Most Gracious. O Allah!
You are the Almighty and we are the weak; You are The All Rich, The Independent and we are the poor, the dependent. O Allah! Give us rain and make of what You have revealed to us a bountiful capacity and message. O Allah, The Reliever of distress, The Responsive to the desperate when praying to You, we seek your repentance and ask your forgiveness for every sin that prevents rain.
O Allah, give us a saving rain, productive, plentiful, continuous. O Allah, we ask your forgiveness for You are The Ever Forgiving. O Allah, give us from the blessings of the sky to increase our gratitude as your giving is plentiful and boundless. O Allah, send upon us helpful, wholesome and healthy rain and do not make us among the despondent.
O Allah, The Ever Merciful, bestow your mercy, provide water for Your servants and Your cattle, display Your mercy and give life to Your dead lands. O Allah, let our crops grow, and let the udders be refilled. Give us from the blessings of the sky and grow for us from the blessings of the earth, You are the Ever Providing.
May Allah grant our leader HH Sheikh Khalifa bin Zayed Al Nahyan and his Deputy,
HH Sheikh Mohammad bin Rashid Al Maktoum, success and provide strength and support to his brothers, Their Highness the Rulers of the Emirates, and his trustworthy Crown Prince HH Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan. May Allah have mercy on Sheikh Zayed and Sheikh Maktoum and all their brothers, the late
UAE Sheikhs.
We ask Allah, the Most Glorious is He, to grant His blessings upon our Master
Muhammad (pbuh), and be pleased with the Rightly Guided Caliphs: Abi Bakr,
Omar, Othman and Ali.
All raise be to Allah, Lord of the Worlds.
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