6 Preface أَلَم يَجِدكَ يَتيمًا فَآوىٰYusuf AliDid He not find thee1 an orphan and give thee shelter (and care)?2Judge the future from the past. God has been good to you in your past experience: trust His goodness in the future also. Again, there is a particular and a general meaning. Three facts are taken from the holy Prophet’s outer life by way of illustration. Metaphorically they also apply to us. And further, the outer facts are themselves types for the spiritual life. See notes below.(1) There is the case of the orphan, literally and figuratively. Our holy Prophet was himself an orphan. His father ‘Abdullāh died young before the child was born, leaving no property. The Prophet’s mother Āmina was in ailing health, and he was chiefly brought up by his nurse Ḥalīma. His mother herself died when he was only six years old. His aged grandfather ‘Abdul Muṭṭalib treated him as his own son, but died two years later. Thereafter his uncle Abū Ṭālib treated him as his own son. He was thus an orphan in more senses than one, and yet the love he received from each one of these persons was greater than ordinary parental love. Each one of us is an orphan in some sense or another, and yet someone’s love and shelter come to us by the grace of God. In the spiritual world there is no father or mother: our very first sustenance and shelter must come from the grace of God.