tional “lam” in “lillah” [to God], expresses the meaning of sole possession and worthiness. As for the qualification of “the Necessarily Existent One, who is named Allah,” since necessary existence is the necessary requisite of the Godhead and a term signifying the All-Glorious Essence; comprising all the divine names and attributes and being the greatest name, the name of “Allah” necessarily indicates both the necessary existence and the title of “Necessarily Existent One.”
If the shortest apparent meaning of the phrase “All praise be to God” on which all the scholars of Arabic are agreed is thus, how could it be translated into another language with the same miraculousness and power?
Furthermore, among all the languages of the world, there is only one that can compare with Arabic in being the language of grammar, and that can never achieve the comprehensiveness of Arabic. Is it possible for translations into other composite and inflectional languages by people whose understanding is partial, comprehension short, ideas confused, and hearts dark, to take the place of the sacred words of the Qur’an, which have emerged in miraculous fashion in that comprehensive and wondrous grammatical language through an all-encompassing knowledge that knows all its aspects at once and wills them. I can even say, and perhaps prove, that all the Qur’an’s words are like treasuries of truths, with sometimes a single letter teaching a page of truths.
SIXTH POINT
I shall recount a luminous experience and true vision I had for the purpose of illucidating the above. It was as follows:
One time, I was pondering over the use of the first person plural in the verse “You alone do we worship and from You alone do we seek help,”(1:4) and my heart was seeking the reason for the first person singular being transposed into the first person plural of “we worship”(na‘budu). Suddenly from that “Nun” the mystery and virtues of performing the prayers in congregation were unfolded to me. I saw that my participating in the congregation in Bayezid Mosque, where I was performing the prayer, made each member of the congregation a sort of intercessor for me who testified to and affirmed each of the statements I pronounced while reciting the prayers. In the midst of the great, multiple worship of the congregation, I felt the courage to offer my deficient worship to the divine court. Then a further veil was lifted. That is, all the mosques of Istanbul were added. The city became like Beyazid Mosque. Suddenly I felt as though I were receiving their prayers and affirmation. Then within that, I saw myself in the mosque of the face of the earth, in the circular rows around the Ka‘ba. I