Is it permissible to pray “O Allah, if this matter is bad for me, then make it good and decree it for me”?

Praise
be to Allah

Firstly:

The basic
principle is that the Muslim should ask Allah to decree good for him, and to
divert from him what is bad. If he does not know whether this matter is good
or bad for him, then what is prescribed for him is to make his request in
supplication dependent upon the knowledge of Allah, may He be glorified and
exalted.

If it is good,
he should ask Allah to let him attain it, and he should offer supplication
to Allah, may He be exalted, and beseech Him in his supplication, for He,
may He be glorified, answers the prayer of those who are in desperate
straits and persist in beseeching Him. If it is bad, it is not permissible
for him to ask Allah to let him attain something that is bad.

If he does not
know whether it is good or bad, then let him say – as in du‘aa’ al-istikhaarah
– : “O Allah, if it is good, then ordain it for me, make it easy for me, and
bless it for me; and if it is bad, then turn it away from me and turn me
away from it, and ordain for me the good wherever it may be and make me
pleased with it.”

Al-Haafiz Ibn
Rajab said: The things that a person may ask for from Allah, may He be
glorified and exalted, are of two types:

The first type
is that which he knows is purely good, such as asking Him to instil fear of
Allah in his heart and make him obedient and righteous, or asking Him for
Paradise and seeking refuge with Him from Hell. These things may be sought
from Allah, may He be exalted, without hesitation and without making it
dependent upon divine knowledge of their appropriateness and whether it is
in the individual’s best interests, because they are purely good and
entirely appropriate and in the individual’s best interests, so there is no
point in stating a condition when what is sought is known to be definitely
good.

The second type
is that which it is not known whether it is good for the individual or not,
such as death and life, wealth and poverty, children and family, and all
other worldly needs of which the consequences are unknown.

It is not
appropriate to ask Allah for any of these things except what Allah knows to
be good for the individual, because he does not know the outcomes and
consequences of things. Moreover, he is unable to bring what is in his
interests or ward off what is harmful to him. So he must seek his needs from
One Who is All-Knowing, Almighty. Hence it is prescribed to pray istikhaarah
and seek guidance in all worldly matters, and it is prescribed for the
supplicant to say in his prayer for guidance: “O Allah, I seek Your guidance
[in making a choice] by virtue of Your knowledge, and I seek ability by
virtue of Your power, and I ask You of Your great bounty. For You have power
and I have none; You have knowledge and I have none, and You are the Knower
of the unseen. O Allah, if in Your knowledge, this matter [then it should be
mentioned by name] is good for me both in my religious and worldly affairs…”

End quote from
Majmoo‘ Rasaa’il Ibn Rajab (1/153).

Secondly:

It is not
prescribed for a person to ask Allah to help him to attain what he seeks
regardless of whether it is good or bad, or to say in his supplication, If
attaining this matter is bad, then make it good. That is for the following
reasons:

·       

Such a
supplication is unheard-of in the Sunnah and in the words of the early
generations. Rather what is known is du‘aa’ al-istikhaarah, which is the
opposite of that. So we should not turn away from istikhaarah to the
opposite.

·       

The individual
should call upon his Lord in a humble manner, expressing desperation, asking
Him to make what is good easy for him and to ward off from him what is bad.
If, every time he wants something, he asks Allah to help him to attain it if
it is good, and to make it good if it is bad, then his supplication will not
be a supplication of need and humility; rather it will be a supplication
based on the desire to attain the hoped-for thing by any means, to the
extent that even if attaining it is bad for him, he asks Allah to make it
good!

What this means
is that the individual is insisting on getting what he wants, and that is
contrary to delegating the matter to Allah and submitting completely to Him,
may He be exalted.

·       

The one who
supplicates in this manner is forgetting the meaning of the verse in which
Allah, may He be exalted, says (interpretation of the meaning):

“and
it may be that you dislike a thing which is good for you and that you like a
thing which is bad for you. Allah knows but you do not know”

[al-Baqarah
2:216].

Supplication (du‘aa’)
may alter the divine decree if altering it will achieve something good and
ward off something bad or evil. The hadith “Nothing changes the divine
decree except supplication (du‘aa’)” does not mean that supplication turns
something bad into something good; rather what it means is that supplication
is one of the means of warding off calamity after the causes thereof are
present. see the answer to question no. 112094.

We put this
question to our shaykh, ‘Abd ar-Rahmaan al-Barraak (may Allah preserve him)
and he said:

This
supplication is contrary to the Islamic prescription of du‘aa’ al-istikhaarah,
and it is giving preference to one’s whims and desires and opinion; it is
insisting on the thing that one wants and failing to delegate the matter to
Allah. Therefore it comes under the heading of exceeding the bounds in
supplication. End quote.

For more
information please see questions no. 220639 and
105366.

And Allah knows
best.