ROOMS IN A HOUSE

August 25, 1978, Friday, 5:08 a.m.

A‘udhu billahi minash-shaitanir-rajim.

I seek refuge in Allah from the accursed satan.

Bismillahir-Rahmanir-Rahim.

In the name of Allah, the Most Compassionate, the Most Merciful.

Bismillahir-Rahmanir-Rahim. Anbu, love. Vanakkam, greetings. Children, I give you my compassionate and loving greetings. My precious children, you who are the life within my life, the love within my love, the light within my eyes, and the love within my qalb, my innermost heart—my dearest children, I give you my love. May Allah guide you on the straight path.

Precious jeweled lights of my eye, every day and every second you must search for God and love God. You must search for God with very much love. You should always intend Allah, and search for Him with love. Whether it is in the sun or in the rain, in the night or in the day, it would be good if that awareness develops within you. And may Allah search for you, may He intend you and look at you. May He grant you His grace.

Precious jeweled lights of my eye, we need to worship Allah. There are many ways that we pray. There are many methods of prayer and there are many steps for prayer. Dearest children, we need to understand that our prayer is like lighting a house. Just as we put light in a house, just as we decorate a house, and just as we clear and beautify it, we must do this to our own house, the cage of our body; we must clean our house like this. We must decorate it, make it pure, beautify it, and place light within it. Precious jeweled lights of my eye, to do this in our cage is called prayer.

The way we worship is similar to what we do to a house: we clean that house that has been built with earth, fire, water, and air; we pour the cement there, beautify it with paint and marble, and decorate the interior with different objects. This is what we do to our house that is built with earth, fire, water, air, and ether. We build that house and find whatever is necessary to make it clean. We clear it, level it, and make it beautiful. We apply the necessary paint and plaster and marble. We clear it, clean it, and add the rooms that are needed: a bathroom, a shower, a kitchen, a room for prayer, a bedroom, and a hall or parlor to receive visitors. We also add a dining room in which to serve food; we place a table there, and whatever else is necessary. We have a secret room1 to conduct affairs that are secret and a public room to conduct our public affairs. Like this, for prayer and for our life, there are ways in which we conduct ourselves in public and ways in which we worship by ourselves. There are ways in which we conduct the world and family matters and there are ways in which we conduct ourselves in secret.

In our homes, there are different rooms for this. In a single house there will be a prayer room, a living room, a bathroom, a kitchen, and a public room. This is how we live in one place. The secret of our life is like this. Prayer is a secret room, prayer is a pure room. Our life is also a secret room.

Although a bathroom is common to all, when you enter the bathroom you should enter it alone, with modesty, shyness, reserve, and fear of wrongdoing. Like this, just as we differentiate between the use of the various rooms in our life, we must fashion different, beautiful rooms for devotion to God, for prayer, for duty, for service, for the spiritual teachings, and for secrets. This is how we can live an exalted life. Just as we build a house on the outside, we must also build a place to worship God on the inside. It is in this way that we can live a life of excellence.

In each particular room you must do the duty that is appropriate to it. When you go to the kitchen you must do kitchen work, that duty. Sometimes you will cook alone and sometimes you will join with others. But even if the family is united, even if you are in union with the family, even if you are one family, even if the family is your own blood tie, nevertheless, when you are conducting your life in the room of sex, that is a place where others should not go. Others should not see that. That aspect of your life should not be shared by others, it must be done in secret. It is not the business of others to see that.

There are many different places that must be fashioned in that secret house of our life. This is a subtle house with subtle wisdom, and each kind of work must be done in its own room according to its own nature. Each kind of work must be done in its proper place. Some work can be done outwardly, while some work must be done inwardly. This is the exaltedness of life.

Therefore, there is life, there is the world, there is unanimity, there is unity, there are blood ties, there is God, there is prayer, there is purity, and there is the merging with God where we speak with God. Like this, whatever it is you are doing and no matter who you are doing it for, it must be done in the correct way and in the proper place. Whether it is the world, God, the truth, or darkness, we must know how to separate each thing and keep it in its appropriate place. If a person is able to discover each place, if he is able to fashion these places, and if he is able to clear these places, then he will be able to direct each thing to its rightful section. If he can send these things to their proper places, then he will be able to pray alone in that pure room, that clean room, that room for prayer—that room that is his alone. If he can clear that room and place light there, then he can pray to the One who is worthy of worship, all the time.

Jeweled lights of my eye, this is the excellence of life, this is the subtlety of life, this is the exaltedness of life, and this is the way we must understand life. It is in this way that we must understand the states and subtleties of prayer.

Beloved children, gems of my eye, there is a subtlety to prayer. That subtlety exists. We have not seen God and we have not seen the Truth. Because we have not seen that Treasure of Truth, we are unable to see the Treasure that is God. Truth has no shape. God has no form and God has no color. His grace has no end. Wisdom has no state or end. Our life has no limit. The exaltedness of our worship has no beginning or end, it is complete. That completeness is called vanakkam,2 that completeness is called toluhai,3 that completeness is the only state that we can call prayer. It is called pure Light.

Therefore, precious jeweled lights of my eye, if we want to find out what toluhai is, if we want to know how to search for toluhai and vanakkam, it depends upon how each one fashions his vessel, how he adorns and lights his house. Whether one goes high or low in his worship depends on each one’s qalb, his soul, and his wisdom.

What is prayer? It is desire without desire. You must develop a desire that has no desire, a hunger that has no hunger, a thirst that has no thirst, a wisdom that has no wisdom, and an attachment that has no attachment. If you develop this, if you develop this state and make it firm, then that is the state of prayer.

When a person is hungry, he immediately starts searching for food. There is an awareness that exists within him. In the same way that he searches for food when he is hungry, he should develop another awareness within him, he should develop an awareness within his body, the hunger to search for God. That awareness must form within him. When a person is thirsty, he cries out, “Water! Water! Water! Water!” is that not so? In the same way that he searches for water when he is thirsty, he must develop that love, that thirst for God. Just as he has a thirst for water, the thirst for God should always be forming within his qalb. This should always be forming. Just as he needs his physical vision so that he can see, just as he says, “I need my eyes, I need my eyes,” and just as he protects those eyes, he must develop the eye that can see God, he must develop the certitude of the eye of iman. He must establish that faith.

The state that can give him either happiness or sorrow is always with him. He will search for what he wants, saying, “I want to be happy, I want to be happy.” This is the way that he must melt with love for God. That search for Allah, “I need Allah, I need Allah,” must be established, that striving must be fashioned. Just as he searches for what he needs, “I need wealth, I need wealth, I need wealth,” he must search for Allah’s undiminishing wealth of the akhirah, the kingdom of God. “I need the wealth of grace, I need the wealth of grace.” This awareness must be fashioned in his qalb. The search for this must be established.

Like that, for whatever he intends from Allah, “I need Allah’s qualities, I need those qualities, I need those qualities!” he must search for those qualities. God’s actions should develop within him, “I must have those actions, I must do that duty, I must have Allah’s qualities, I must perform Allah’s actions, I must perform those actions, I must perform those actions!” He must establish that ‘ibadah, that service to God, within him. He must discard whatever else he trusts and trust only in Allahu, “I must establish that trust within me.” He must bring that feeling and awareness into being within him.

In this way, with every intention, at every second, that awareness should be established within him. That feeling and the awareness that he should pray to Allah...