The 99 names of God

In Islam, God has 99 names or, perhaps better, 99 major attributes. In some traditions of Islam these are frequently recited, and they are the reason the Muslim rosary has 99 beads.

I've been learning a little about them because they tend to be in people's names. In the West we often think that Abdul is an Arabic name, but actually it's a sentence fragment -- "servant of the" -- which is followed by one of the names of God. So someone's name might be Abdul Aziz ("servant of the victorious") or Abdur Rahman ("servant of the compassionate"), for example. Whenever I come across one of these names, I've been asking my Arabic-speaking friends what they mean, and as a result getting lessons on the attributes and nature of God.

Today, for example, a student played me a song by Abdul Halim Hafez, and I got to hear about God as Al-Halim, which means "the patient" or "the forebearing," which the student described as meaning that Allah is God of second chances. Actually, whenever I ask about one of these words, the person I ask starts out by saying, "It sort of means [fill-in-the-blank], but the word has a lot more nuances than that..." and then proceeds to tell me more about what someone who had that quality might be like.

So tonight I decided to look up a list of all of the 99 most beautiful names of God, the asma al-Husna. There's a nice list here, but I'm listing them all here because, well, it's my LiveJournal, and I said so.

( God is... )

I'd like to be under the sea / In an octopus's garden with you...

In an unrelated vein...

I DIVED TODAY!

Not in the cool scuba way that kgilmore is diving: just off a diving board into a pool. Justin was teaching me how to dive last summer, and on my last attempt I panicked, overrotated, did something bizarrely painful to my spine, and immediately announced I'd never touch a diving board again. I'm awfully proud of myself for getting back on the horse, so to speak.

Now I write this down, it seems like a dumb thing to be proud of. But one of the things I don't like about myself is that I'm a very fearful person, especially when it comes to physical activity. (Sports and things result in injuries and pain, and I am a total wimp about physical pain.) But I don't want to live a fear-driven life, so I'm always pleased when I do something despite feeling anxious about it.

Now let me at that cockroach!