It is narrated from Maytham (may God be pleased with him) that he said: One night my master, the Commander of the Faithful (Ali ibn Abi Talib), peace be upon him, took me out into the open. He had gone forth from Kufa, and when he reached the mosque of Ju'fi he turned toward the qibla and prayed four rak'ahs. When he had given the salutation and glorified God, he spread out his palms and said: My God, how shall I call upon You when I have disobeyed You, and how shall I not call upon You when I have come to know You and Your love is firmly set in my heart? I have stretched out to You a hand filled with sins and an eye extended in hope. My God, You are the Owner of gifts and I am the captive of my faults, and it belongs to the generosity of the great to be gentle with captives; and I am a captive by my crime, held in pledge by my deed. My God, how narrow is the road for one whose guide You are not, and how desolate the path for one whose companion You are not. My God, if You call me to account for my sins, I shall surely call upon You for Your pardon; if You call me to account for what is hidden within me, I shall surely call upon You for Your generosity; if You call me to account for my evil, I shall surely call upon You for Your goodness; and if You gather me together with Your enemies in the Fire, I shall surely tell them that I was one who loved You and that I bore witness that there is no god but God. My God, this is my joy in You while I am in fear, so how will my joy in You be when I am secure? My God, obedience gladdens You and disobedience does not harm You; so grant me that which gladdens You, and forgive me that which does not harm You, and turn to me in mercy — truly You are the Ever-Relenting, the Merciful. O God, bless Muhammad and the family of Muhammad, and have mercy on me when my trace is cut off from the world, my remembrance is erased from among created beings, and I become one of the forgotten, like one who has been forgotten. My God, my years have grown many, my bones have grown thin, time has taken its toll of me, my appointed term has drawn near, my days have run out, my good qualities have gone, my desire has passed away and the consequences of my acts remain, my body has worn away, my joints have come apart, my limbs have scattered, and I remain held in pledge by my deed. My God, my sins have struck me dumb, my speech is cut off, and I have no argument. My God, I am the one who acknowledges his sin, confesses his crime, is captive to his wrongdoing, held in pledge by his deed, reckless in his transgression, bewildered away from his purpose, and utterly cut off; so bless Muhammad and the family of Muhammad, be gracious to me and pass over my faults. My God, if my deed is small beside Your obedience, my hope is great beside my expectation of You. My God, how should I turn back from Your presence in disappointment and deprivation, when all my thought of Your bounty is that You will turn me back saved and shown mercy? My God, I have not let the despair of those who lose hope prevail over my good opinion of You; so do not bring to nothing the sincerity of my hope from among those who hope. My God, my crime is great since it is You who call me to account for it, and my sin is grave since it is You whom I confronted with it; yet whenever I remember the greatness of my sin together with the greatness of Your pardon and forgiveness, I find that the outcome between the two is the nearer of them to Your mercy and Your good pleasure. My God, if the dread of Your punishment summons me toward the Fire, the goodness of Your reward has called me toward Paradise through hope. My God, if my faults have estranged me from the beauties of Your kindness, the noble acts of Your tenderness have made me intimate through certainty. My God, if heedlessness has lulled me to sleep from preparing to meet You, knowledge of the generosity of Your bounties has awakened me. My God, if my mind strays from setting right what would make me sound, my certainty in Your regard for what benefits me does not stray. My God, if my days have run out in striving other than what You love — yet in faith I spent the days now past — then what of those years of mine that I spent turning away? My God, I have come to You sorrowing, clothed in my own destitution, and the truthfulness of my need has set me among the lowly before You. My God, You are generous, so honour me, since I am one who asks of You; and You are open-handed with Your bounty, so join me to the people of Your gift. My God, I have risen at one of the gates of Your gifts as a beggar, turning away from directing my request to any other than You; and it is not Your way to turn back a sorrowing beggar driven by need to await a good from You to which he is accustomed. My God, I stand upon the bridge of perils, tried by deeds and by testing — unless You help me in both by lightening my loads and burdens. My God, did You create me among the people of wretchedness, so that I should prolong my weeping, or among the people of felicity, so that I should give good news to my hope? My God, if You deprive me of the sight of Muhammad — God bless him and his family — and turn the face of my expectation in that away in disappointment at that station, then my soul had hoped for something other than that, O Possessor of Majesty and Generosity, of bounty and favour. My God, had You not guided me to Islam I would not have been guided; had You not granted me faith in You I would not have believed; had You not loosed my tongue in supplication to You I would not have supplicated; had You not made me know the sweetness of knowing You I would not have known. My God, if falling behind the foremost among the righteous has kept me seated, trust in You has set me upon the ascending paths of the good. My God, a heart that You filled with love of You in the abode of this world — how should You set over it a fire to burn it in the blaze? My God, every afflicted one takes refuge with You, and every deprived one places his hope in You. My God, the worshippers heard of the abundance of Your reward and grew humble; those who had slipped from the straight way heard of Your open-handedness and returned; the sinners heard of the breadth of Your mercy and took their portion; and the criminals heard of the generosity of Your pardon and grew eager — until the bands of the disobedient among Your servants thronged together and every one of them cried out to You with the clamour of those who wail in supplication throughout Your lands; and for every hope that has driven its owner to You there is a need. And You are the One asked, before whom the faces of petitioners are never darkened. Bless Muhammad Your Prophet and his family, and do with me what You are worthy of; truly You are the Hearer of supplication. Then he lowered his voice in supplication, prostrated himself and rubbed his face in the dust, and said 'Pardon, pardon' a hundred times. Then he rose and went out, and I followed him until he came out into the open desert. He drew a line for me and said: Beware of crossing this line. Then he went on away from me; and it was a pitch-dark night. I said: O my soul, you have abandoned your master, and he has many enemies; what excuse will you have before God and before His Messenger? By God, I shall follow his trace and learn his news, even though I have gone against his command. So I began to follow his trace, and I found him, peace be upon him, leaning into a well up to half his body, addressing the well while the well addressed him. He sensed my presence, turned, peace be upon him, and said: Who is it? I said: Maytham. He said: O Maytham, did I not command you not to cross the line? I said: My master, I feared for you from your enemies, and my heart could not bear it. He said: Did you hear anything of what I said? I said: No, my master. Then he said: O Maytham — 'In the breast there are needs; when my breast grows narrow for them, I strike the earth with my palm and disclose to it my secret. So whatever the earth brings forth, that growth is from my seed.' (al-Mazar, vol. 1, p. 270)
Maytham al-Tammar said: One night my master, the Commander of the Faithful (AS), went out from Kufa and made his way to the mosque of Ju'fi for night vigil. Facing the qibla, he prayed four rak'ahs. Then he raised his hands to heaven and communed with God in these words.
(This intimate supplication, which begins with the words 'My God, how shall I call upon You when I have disobeyed You, and how shall I not call upon You when I have come to know You and Your love is firmly set in my heart', and which is known as the Ju'fiyya Munajat, is one of the beautiful yet neglected supplications of the Commander of the Faithful (AS). To render such phrases into other words defeats their very purpose, and the text is relatively self-explanatory.)
Maytham said: After this intimate supplication the Commander of the Faithful (AS) laid his head down in prostration and kept saying 'Pardon, pardon'. I counted; he said it a hundred times. Then he rose and set out for the open desert, and I too went along after him. When we reached a certain place he drew a line around me in the sand and said: Do not go outside this line until I return. He left me and went off in one direction. It was a frightening night, and fear and misgiving overcame me, and I said: what if his life is in danger? So after a little while I went outside the line and set off after him. I saw that he had put his head into a well and was half-way down inside it, speaking to the well while the well too spoke to him. He became aware of my presence, ceased speaking with the well, and said: Maytham, what did I tell you? I said: I feared for your life! He said: Did you not hear anything of what I said? I said: No! He said: Maytham! There are sometimes words in the heart that nothing but the earth can bear. Then he recited a line of verse to this effect: I bury my words in the earth, and whenever the earth brings anything forth, it is from the seeds I have sown in its heart.
The book al-Durra al-Bahira min al-Asdaf al-Tahira, attributed to al-Shahid al-Awwal and written in Arabic, is a collection of hadiths of the noble Prophet (PBUH) and the infallible Imams (AS). The book contains 169 hadiths in the field of manners and ethics. The author cites, in order, hadiths from the Prophet (PBUH) and then from each of the Imams one by one. Al-Durra al-Bahira has been ascribed both to al-Shahid al-Awwal and also listed among the compositions of Qutb al-Din al-Bayhaqi al-Kaydari (a jurist and man of letters of the seventh century and a student of Khwaja Nasir al-Din al-Tusi). The first to attribute this book to al-Shahid al-Awwal was Allama al-Majlisi in Bihar al-Anwar. Mirza Abdallah Afandi, in his gloss on Amal al-Amil, holds that the book was written by someone other than al-Shahid. Two old manuscripts of the work survive: one at the Astan-i Quds-i Radawi and the other in the Maktabat al-Haydariyya library in Najaf.