Yet who can block the radiance of a sun once it rises, or hide the full moon when night is rent and it appears?

The light of your Lord can never be extinguished, even if (1) some cunning scoundrel should labour with all his might to snuff it out.

Every person of insight knows that he is sustained by an outpouring from the boundless ocean of his Lord’s gifts.

You yourselves remember how those men—whose circumstances in Egypt you know full well—summoned him there.

So, when that land had turned inhospitable, he sought Allah’s guidance before departing (2), performed istikhāra, and then set out.

His Master chose the road he would travel, granted him success upon it, and prepared for him every means of right guidance.

He journeyed on while Allah watched over and protected him—how could it be otherwise, when upon Him alone he relied?

Never is the sun screened by clouds above one land without its beams lighting another.

Had the pearl remained clinging to its shell, it would never have risen to grace slender throats, mounted crowns, or sat enthroned upon them (3).

On the day of departure his leave-taking left no one possessed of patience or endurance with any patience or endurance at all.

It was as though the camel-driver, when he bore him away, was urging the very hearts toward Egypt.

Eyes wept until, from grief at his separation, they were on the verge of turning white, and the foremost of them grew inflamed from weeping (4).

Such were the events—and how many a soul parched with yearning for him was left unslaked before the moment of parting came