This letter, written to Muadhdhin Hadji Yûsuf, explains the meaning in the words of the adhân:
First of all, I thank Allâhu ta’âlâ. I pronounce my salât, salâm and benedictions over His beloved Prophet. Be it known that there are seven words in the adhân. [They add up to fifteen by repetition. It is the adhân to pronounce these fifteen words and to hear them. When it is pronounced melodiously through a loud-speaker, these words cannot be heard. In this case, what we hear is a buzzing sound, repetition or something which cannot be understood. So, loud-speakers destroy the adhân, rather than being a means for pronouncing it.]
1 - ALLÂHU AKBAR: Allâhu ta’âlâ is the greatest. He needs nothing. He is too great to need the worships of His slaves. Worships give no benefit to Him. In order to settle this important meaning well in minds, the word is repeated four times. [The first and the third r’s are recited with jazm or fatha in wasl.]
2 - ASH’HADU AN LÂ ILÂHA IL-LAL-LAH: Though He does not need anyone’s worship owing to His greatness, I bear witness and certainly believe that none besides Him is worthy of being worshipped. Nothing is like Him.
3 - ASH’HADU ANNA MUHAMMADAN RASÛLULLAH: I bear witness and believe that Hadrat Muhammad ‘sallallâhu alaihi wa sallam’ is the Prophet sent by Him, that he is the communicant of the way of the worships liked by Him, that only worships communicated and shown by him are suitable.
4-5 - HAYYA ’ALASSALÂH, HAYYA ’ALALFALÂH: These are the two words inviting the Believers to namâz, which causes happiness and salvation.
6 - ALLAHU AKBAR: No one can do the worship worthy of Him. He is so great, so far from anyone’s worship being worthy of Him or suitable for Him.
7 - LÂ ILÂHA IL-LAL-LAH: He, alone, has the right to be worshipped, to humiliate oneself before. Along with the fact that
no one can do the worship worthy of Him, no one besides Him is worthy of being worshipped.
Greatness of the honour in namâz should be understood from the greatness of these words selected to inform everybody with it. Translation of a Persian line:
“The year’s prolificity is predictable by the spring.”
O Our Allah! For the sake and honour of the Master and the highest of Prophets ‘alaihi wa alaihimussalawâtu wattaslîmât’, include us among those who perform namâz as you like them to and who will thus be rescued from Thine torment! Âmîn.
[In the section on the sûra of Inshirâh, the tafsîr of Sâwî quotes, “Allâhu ta’âlâ said, ‘I will exalt your name in the East, in the West and everywhere on the globe.’ ” When a distance of a longitude is travelled towards the west, the time of each namâz comes four minutes later. At the end of every