Al-Kahf · Makki · ayah 10 of 110

Al-Kahf 18:10

إِذْ أَوَى ٱلْفِتْيَةُ إِلَى ٱلْكَهْفِ فَقَالُوا۟ رَبَّنَآ ءَاتِنَا مِن لَّدُنكَ رَحْمَةً وَهَيِّئْ لَنَا مِنْ أَمْرِنَا رَشَدًا

“[Mention] when the youths retreated to the cave and said, "Our Lord, grant us from Yourself mercy and prepare for us from our affair right guidance."”

Saheeh International

Essence

The first thing the surah tells us about them is not their number or their names but the eleven words they said on going in.

A reflection

What they did not ask for

Count the requests. There are two. Mercy from Your own side, and rightness prepared out of our affair. That is the whole prayer.

Now count what is missing. No request to be hidden. No request for food, or for the king to die, or for the search to be called off, or for their families to understand. A group of young men have just run for their lives into a hole in a mountain. Neither of their two sentences mentions the danger.

The second word repays attention. The lexicons make its root the straightness of a road, and they paint the scene. A man stands between two roads and does not know which one reaches where he is going. Someone points him to it, and if he accepts and walks it, he is the one rightly guided. Travellers were wished it as a greeting: may you keep to the right road.

So they are not asking to be rescued. They are asking to be pointed.

A player once brought a violin to a maker and asked for a louder bridge, because the instrument would not carry in a hall. The maker listened, took the top plate pressure off, moved the soundpost about a millimetre and handed it back. The bridge was never the problem. The player had correctly identified the symptom and named the wrong part.

Most of our prayers are a request for a louder bridge.

The full entry has 6 more reflections, questions to sit with, and "Live it today" - with the words, the roots and the tafsir alongside. Free, no account, works offline.