Du‘ā for anxiety, distress and grief

When worry, a calamity or grief is heavy, the Qur’ān and the narrations give words to say. This page gathers the du‘ās the Sabīl library files under distress and grief, and the verses of the Qur’ān that speak of hardship, patience and ease. Each du‘ā is shown with its Arabic, a transliteration, its meaning and the source and grade the library gives; the narrations they come from are listed by number at the end. Under some verses the page also shows the notes of that edition; they are the edition’s words, not this page’s, and this page has not checked them. For your own circumstances, ask a scholar; and if the weight is more than words can carry, speak to someone near you, too.

What the Qur’ān says of hardship

The Qur’ān says plainly that people will be tested with something of fear and famine, and loss of property, lives and fruits, and it describes the patient as those who, when a calamity strikes them, say that they belong to Allah and will return to Him. Of them it says that blessings and mercy from their Lord are upon them.

It also says, twice over, that with hardship comes ease. The edition’s note under the first of the two verses explains the repetition.

And it says where hearts find tranquility: in the remembrance of Allah.

The call of Yūnus, and refuge from anxiety and sorrow

The first card of the Du‘ā Compilation headed “Distress & grief” holds two du‘ās. The first is the call of Yūnus from the darkness, from Qur’ān 21:87: a declaration that there is no god but Allah, a glorification of Him, and an admission of wrong. Its source line quotes at-Tirmidhī’s narration that no Muslim supplicates with it for anything but that Allah answers him, with the grade ṣaḥīḥ.

The second asks for refuge from eight things, in pairs: anxiety and sorrow, incapacity and idleness, cowardice and miserliness, the burden of debt and being overpowered by men. The library cites it to al-Bukhārī with the grade ṣaḥīḥ.

The verse of Yūnus’s call, and the verse after it, which says that Allah answered him and rescued him from distress, and that this is how He rescues the believers:

Asking for all your affairs to be set right

The second card under the same heading has one du‘ā, calling on Allah as the Ever-Living and the Sustainer, asking for relief by His mercy, for all one’s affairs to be set right, and not to be left to oneself for the blink of an eye. The library cites it to an-Nasā’ī in ‘Amal al-Yawm wal-Laylah with the grade ḥasan.

Beneath it the card has a note of the library’s own: when grief takes a person’s words away, these become the words, and someone who has not memorised them can read them, since reading is also supplication.

At any calamity

The Pocket Companion has a card headed “Distress & anxiety”. It begins with a du‘ā it labels “At any calamity”, which praises Allah as the Mighty, the Forbearing, Lord of the Mighty Throne and of the heavens and the earth. Its source line calls it the du‘ā of distress and cites al-Bukhārī and Muslim with the grade ṣaḥīḥ.

The card then gives the two du‘ās of the first card above again. The du‘ā of Yūnus is in the same Arabic, its meaning in slightly different words. In the refuge du‘ā the Pocket Companion has miserliness and cowardice the other way round from the Du‘ā Compilation, and gives the meaning as a short list. The library cites both wordings to al-Bukhārī, and this page does not choose between them.

When the grief is for someone who has died

The Pocket Companion has a card headed “Grief & death”, in four parts: what is said on hearing of a death, a du‘ā for the one who has died, words for consoling the bereaved, and the greeting at a grave. The library’s own checking has not yet settled questions about one of its texts, the du‘ā for the one who has died: how the whole of it is to be printed, and how it is rendered. So the card is not quoted here. To read it as the library has it, open the Pocket Companion’s “Grief & death” card. The words said at a calamity in 2:156, above, are the Qur’ān’s own.

References

Verses of the Qur’ān, by sūrah and verse, shown above: 2:155–157; 13:28; 21:87–88; 94:5–6.

Narrations, by collection and number as sunnah.com numbers them: al-Bukhārī by the numbering of Fatḥ al-Bārī; Muslim by Muḥammad Fuʾād ʿAbd al-Bāqī’s numbers, with the letter sunnah.com adds where it divides one; al-Tirmidhī by sunnah.com’s numbering of the Jāmiʿ. The library names the collection under each du‘ā; the number is the narration it cites.

• The du‘ā of Yūnus, and that it is answered: Jāmiʿ al-Tirmidhī 3505.
• Refuge from anxiety and sorrow: Ṣaḥīḥ al-Bukhārī 6369; in the Pocket Companion’s order, Ṣaḥīḥ al-Bukhārī 6363.
• The du‘ā of distress: Ṣaḥīḥ al-Bukhārī 6346; Ṣaḥīḥ Muslim 2730a.
• The du‘ā calling on Allah as the Ever-Living and the Sustainer: an-Nasā’ī, ‘Amal al-Yawm wal-Laylah, as the library cites it. sunnah.com does not carry that book, so no number is given here.

From the Sabīl library: the Du‘ā Compilation, the two cards “Distress & grief”; the Pocket Companion, the card “Distress & anxiety”, and the card “Grief & death”, linked, not quoted.

Where to go next

• Du‘ā by need has the rest of the Du‘ā Compilation, arranged by what you are asking for.
• The Du‘ā Compilation and the Pocket Companion can be printed as cards to keep with you.
• Janāzah is the library’s title on what is done when a Muslim dies.