30 – My grandfather informed us; al-Ṣalāḥ ibn Abī ʿUmar informed us; al-Fakhr ibn al-Bukhārī informed us; Ḥanbal informed us; Ibn al-Ḥuṣayn informed us; Ibn al-Madhhab informed us; Abū Bakr al-Qaṭīʿī informed us; ʿAbd Allāh ibn Aḥmad ibn ⦗41⦘ Ḥanbal informed us; ʿImrān ibn Bikār informed us; al-Rabīʿ ibn Rūḥ informed us; Ismāʿīl ibn ʿAyyāsh, from Abū Ḥanīfah, from Ḥammād, from Ibrāhīm, from ʿAlqamah ibn Qays, from ʿAbd Allāh ibn Masʿūd, who said:

The Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) used to teach us the supplication of istikhārah just as he would teach us a surah from the Quran. He said: “When any of you intends to undertake a matter, let him perform ablution, then pray two units of prayer, and then say:

‘O Allah, I seek the best outcome through Your knowledge, I ask You to empower me through Your power, and I beg You from Your bounty; for You know and I do not know, You are able and I am not able, and You are the Knower of the unseen. If You know that this matter is good for me in my religion, in my livelihood, and in the end of my affair, then decree it for me and make it easy for me. But if something else is better for me, then decree the good for me wherever it may be, and make me content with it.’”