The Quran

Preface

فَتَبَسَّمَ ضاحِكًا مِن قَولِها وَقالَ رَبِّ أَوزِعني أَن أَشكُرَ نِعمَتَكَ الَّتي أَنعَمتَ عَلَيَّ وَعَلىٰ والِدَيَّ وَأَن أَعمَلَ صالِحًا تَرضاهُ وَأَدخِلني بِرَحمَتِكَ في عِبادِكَ الصّالِحينَ

Yusuf Ali

So he smiled, amused at her speech; and he said: “O my Lord! so order me that I may be grateful for Thy favours, which thou hast bestowed on me and¹ on my parents, and that I may work the righteousness that will please Thee:² And admit me, by Thy Grace, to the ranks of Thy righteous Servants.”³

The counterpart to the position of the humble ant is the position of a great king like Solomon, He prays that his power and wisdom and other gifts may be used for righteousness and for the benefit of all around him. The ant being in his thoughts, we may suppose that he means particularly in his prayer that he may not even unwittingly tread on humble beings in his preoccupation with the great things of the world.
The righteousness which pleases the world is often very different from the righteousness which pleases God. Solomon prays that he may always take God’s Will as his standard, rather than the standards of men.
In the Kingdom of God, righteousness is the badge of citizenship. And although there are great and noble grades (see n. 586 to 4:69), the base of that citizenship is the universal brotherhood of righteousness. The greatest in that Kingdom are glad and proud to pray for that essential badge.