75 — Times When Supplication Is Answered

When Allah—Glorious is His Majesty—prescribed supplication for His servants, encouraged and urged them to engage in it, and graciously and generously promised to answer them, He also provided them with blessed places, blessed times, and important etiquettes. A servant’s share of acceptance and response will correspond to the extent to which he fulfills and attends to these matters.

Among the blessed times during which a Muslim should seek to supplicate Allah are the predawn hours and the time when the final third of the night remains. Allah Most High says, “And those who seek forgiveness before dawn” 1; and He Most High says, “They used to sleep but little of the night, and before dawn they would seek forgiveness” 2. It is established through a mass-transmitted hadith that the Prophet, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, said: “Our Lord, Blessed and Exalted, descends every night to the lowest heaven when the final third of the night remains. He says: ‘Who will call upon Me so that I may answer him? Who will ask Me so that I may give him? Who will seek My forgiveness so that I may forgive him?’”3

This momentous hadith demonstrates the honor of this time in Allah’s sight and its immense importance to Him. In His perfect beneficence and complete kindness, He—Glorified is He—descends by Himself at that time to the lowest heaven, in a real descent befitting Him, unlike the descent of created beings. Exalted and far removed is Allah from that. No created being knows how He—Glorified is He—descends, for the modality of His attributes—Glorified is He—is unknown