89 Preface وَزَكَرِيّا إِذ نادىٰ رَبَّهُ رَبِّ لا تَذَرني فَردًا وَأَنتَ خَيرُ الوارِثينَYusuf AliAnd (remember) Zakariya,1 when he cried to his Lord: “O my Lord! leave me not without offspring, though thou art the best of inheritors.”2See 19:2-15, and 3:38-41. Zakariya was a priest; both he and his wife were devout and punctilious in their duties. They were old, and they had no son. He was troubled in mind, not so much by the vulgar desire to have a son to carry on his line, but because he felt that his people were not unselfishly devout, and there would be no sincere work for God unless he could train some one himself. He was given a son Yahya (John the Baptist), who added to the devout reputation of the family, for he is called “noble, chaste, and a prophet,” (3:39). All three, father, mother, and son, were made worthy of each other, and they repelled evil by their devout emulation in virtue,It is not that I crave a personal heir to myself; all things go back to Thee, and Thou art the best of inheritors: but I see no one around me sincere enough to carry on my work for Thee; wilt Thou give me one whom I can train?'