Seek forgiveness before you sleep

Seek forgiveness from Allah in the morning and evening

۞وَعِندَهُۥ مَفَاتِحُ ٱلۡغَيۡبِ لَا يَعۡلَمُهَآ إِلَّا هُوَۚ

وَيَعۡلَمُ مَا فِي ٱلۡبَرِّ وَٱلۡبَحۡرِۚ وَمَا تَسۡقُطُ

مِن وَرَقَةٍ إِلَّا يَعۡلَمُهَا وَلَا حَبَّةٖ

فِي ظُلُمَٰتِ ٱلۡأَرۡضِ وَلَا رَطۡبٖ وَلَا يَابِسٍ إِلَّا فِي كِتَٰبٖ مُّبِينٖ

With Him are the keys of the Unseen. No one knows them but He. He knows what is in the land and the sea. No leaf ever falls but that He knows about it, and there is no grain in the dark layers of the earth, or anything fresh or dry that is not recorded in a manifest book.

وَهُوَ الَّذِي يَتَوَفَّاكُمْ بِاللَّيْلِ وَيَعْلَمُ مَا جَرَحْتُمْ

بِالنَّهارِ ثُمَّ يَبْعَثُكُمْ فِيهِ لِيُقْضى

أَجَلٌ مُسَمًّى ثُمَّ إِلَيْهِ مَرْجِعُكُمْ ثُمَّ يُنَبِّئُكُمْ بِما كُنْتُمْ تَعْمَلُونَ

He is the One who recalls your souls by night, and knows what you do by day; then He makes you rise up therein, so that a fixed term may be fulfilled. Thereafter, to Him are you to return; then He will tell you what you have been doing. [6:59-60]

Allah’s power over the whole universe

In these ayahs, Allah is showing his power. The Quranic style is to talk about Allah’s signs in the universe first, and then signs close to us.

In this ayah from Surat al-An’am, Allah talks about His knowledge of everything that happens in the universe: even a drop of water or leaves falling from a tree. He knows exactly how many, where they fell, and when. This level of knowledge is beyond our comprehension.

Allah’s power over you

In the next ayah, He goes on to talk about something close to us. He uses the word yatawaffaakum, to recall a soul, which is from the root wafat, meaning death. We take for granted that we go to sleep at night and then wake up in the morning, but Allah is reminding us that going to sleep is actually a minor death every night.

Allah knows what you have done during day. Here He uses the word jarahtum for all the things you have done in the day. Jarahtum derives from the word jurh, meaning injury. He is saying your actions are like injuries to yourself. This is also why we use the word jawaarih to mean limbs – things through which you can do good or bad things.

The term “Al-Jawarih” is synonymous with “Al-Kawasib” and this became widespread, so the term “Kasb” (earning) was referred to as “Al-Jarh” (wounding), and this is the intended meaning here.

With all the bad deeds you have done, He could have seized your soul and never given it back. We ask Allah for forgiveness for all these sins.

Seek forgiveness at every opportunity

By putting our soul back into our bodies, Allah is giving us another chance to seek forgiveness and rectify what we have done. Every day is new opportunity, but those who don’t reflect, take it for granted.

In the hadith, the Prophet Muhammad (peace be on him) told us that:

There are angels who take turns in visiting you by night and by day, and they all assemble at the time of the Fajr and Asr prayers. [Bukhari]

The angels change shift at Fajr, so we have new angels when we wake up, we have new angels. These are the angels who record everything we do.

Don’t let the angels go with a bad record about you. Do istighfar before you go to sleep, and when you open your day. We are now in Ramadan, which is the time to rectify your mistakes and do your best to have a good start with Allah, and a good start with your family, employees, neighbours, etc.

We don’t know when Allah will wake us up

No one but Allah knows when we will go to sleep and never wake up. The People of the Cave thought they had slept for a day or half a day, when in fact they had slept for three hundred years.

There are also people who are asleep even though they are awake. People who cannot see the truth and the reality, and are siding with falsehood and oppression. By the time they die and see the truth, it will be too late for them.

Prophetic duas for the morning and evening

We need to take this opportunity on daily basis. When the Prophet Muhammad (peace be on him) went to sleep, he used to make two duas.

بِاسْـمِكَ اللّهُـمَّ أَمـوتُ وَأَحْـيا

In Your Name, O Allah, I die and I live. [Muslim]

بِاسْمِكَ رَبِّي وَضَعْتُ جَنْبِي وَبِكَ أَرْفَعُهُ فَإِن أَمْسَكْتَ نَفْسِي فارْحَمْهَا وَإِنْ أَرْسَلْتَهَا فَاحْفَظْهَا بِمَا تَحْفَظُ بِهِ عِبَادَكَ الصَّالِحِينَ

With Your Name my Lord, I lay myself down; and with Your Name I rise. And if You take my soul, have mercy on it, and if You send it back then protect it as You protect Your righteous slaves. [Bukhari]

And when he woke up, he would say:

الحَمْـدُ لِلّهِ الّذي أَحْـيانا بَعْـدَ ما أَماتَـنا وَإليه النُّـشور

Praise is to Allah Who gives us life after He has caused us to die and to Him is the return. [Bukhari]

This is a reminder from the Prophet (peace be on him) to praise Allah for his favours every day. Let’s use this time as opportunities to fix our record with Allah.

Delivered by Shaykh Haytham Tamim as his tarawih reflection on 2nd Ramadan /March 2025. Transcribed by H Khan.

Ghazali on tawbah

Ghazali on tawbah part 2

Ghazali on tawbah part 3

How to receive the light of Allah

Knowing Allah through His beautiful name Al Ghafoor

Duas for forgiveness

What do I need to know about repentance?

Essentials of repentance

Major and Minor sins

Fear: Sins

Riba