No. 58 of 124 · A Name of God · The Long Healing Prayer
The Beauteous One
In calling upon God as The Beauteous One, the prayer invites us to turn toward a beauty that heals by its very nature.
I call on Thee O Most Sublime One, O Beauteous One, O Bounteous One! Thou the Sufficing, Thou the Healing, Thou the Abiding, O Thou Abiding One! Bahá'u'lláh, The Long Healing Prayer · read the full prayer
Plain meaning · Beauteous
Full of beauty; beautiful; very handsome. [Mostly poetic]
Definition from Webster's Dictionary, 1913 edition (public domain). When these Writings were translated into English, the translator relied on Webster's New International Dictionary, 1934 edition, of the same Webster's tradition. source
What “The Beauteous One” means
The meaning above is the plain dictionary definition of the word. What follows reflects on it as a name of God, offered for your own contemplation, and not as an authoritative interpretation of the Bahá'í Writings, which rests with ‘Abdu'l-Bahá and Shoghi Effendi alone.
When we speak of beauty in everyday life, we usually mean something that pleases the eye or lifts the spirit for a moment, a landscape, a piece of music, a kind face. The name 'The Beauteous One,' however, points toward something far more fundamental: a beauty that is not created or discovered but that is the very source of all loveliness we have ever glimpsed. To address God by this name is to acknowledge that whatever is genuinely beautiful in the world is, in some sense, a reflection or an emanation of a divine quality that belongs to God alone.
This name sits alongside 'The Most Sublime One' and 'The Bounteous One' in the same breath of the prayer, and the company is telling. Sublimity, beauty, and generosity are placed together as if they naturally belong in one another's presence. Divine beauty, in this light, is not ornamental. It is not decoration applied to something that exists separately. It is woven into the essence of what God is, and recognizing it is itself an act of worship, a kind of seeing that changes the one who sees.
There is a long tradition in mystical thought, across many religions, of beauty being understood as one of the faces of the sacred. In the Bahá'í writings, the very name 'Bahá', the name Bahá'u'lláh chose to identify himself and his revelation, carries the meaning of glory and beauty. So when this prayer asks us to call on God as The Beauteous One, it is connecting us to something central in the spiritual vision of the Faith: that God's glory and God's beauty are not separate things, and that turning toward one is turning toward the other.
Calling on The Beauteous One for healing
When illness or suffering narrows our world, beauty is often one of the first things that recedes. Pain and fear are demanding presences, and it can become genuinely difficult to perceive loveliness in anything. Calling upon God as The Beauteous One in the midst of that kind of darkness is not a denial of what we are going through. It is more like pressing a hand against a wall we know is solid, an act of trust that something is still there even when we cannot see it clearly. The name itself becomes an anchor. We are saying, in effect, that the source of all beauty has not gone anywhere, even if our capacity to feel it has temporarily dimmed.
There is something quietly restorative about this particular invocation. To spend even a few moments holding the idea of God as the origin of all that is beautiful, and directing our attention, our longing, and our need toward that source, can gently shift the quality of our inner state. This is not a formula and carries no guarantee of a specific outcome. Healing of any kind, whether of body, mind, or spirit, remains in God's hands, and we are wise to work in partnership with competent physicians and caregivers for our medical needs. But prayer addressed to The Beauteous One offers something real: a reminder that we are reaching toward a God whose very nature includes a radiance that has always been, and will always be, turned toward us.
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Living the Word
Applying The Beauteous One in your life
A name of God is a virtue to grow into. Where is The Beauteous One being asked of you right now, and how will you practice it? Keep a short note each time you return, and watch your own path with this name take shape over time. It stays on this device.
In the Bahá'í Writings
“God Is the Great Compassionate Physician Who Alone Gives True Healing October 19th All true healing comes from God! There are two causes for sickness, one is material, the other spiritual. If the sickness is of the body, a material remedy is needed, if of the soul, a spiritual remedy. If the heavenly benediction be upon us while we are being healed then only can we be made whole, for medicine is but the outward and visible means through which we obtain the heavenly healing. Unless the spirit be healed, the cure of the body is worth nothing. All is in the hands of God, and without Him there can be no health in us! There have been many men who have died at last of the very disease of which they have made a special study. Aristotle, for instance, who made a special study of the digestion, died of a gastric malady. Avicenna was a specialist of the heart, but he died of heart disease. God is the great compassionate Physician who alone has the power to give true healing. All creatures are dependent upon God, however great may seem their knowledge, power and independence.”
Read in full at bahai.org →“21.1That which the Lord hath ordained as the sovereign remedy and mightiest instrument for the healing of all the world is the union of all its peoples in one universal Cause, one common Faith. This can in no wise be achieved except through the power of a skilled, an all-powerful and inspired Physician. This, verily, is the truth, and all else naught but error. 22.1Beware, O believers in the Unity of God, lest ye be tempted to make any distinction between any of the Manifestations of His Cause, or to discriminate against the signs that have accompanied and proclaimed their Revelation. This indeed is the true meaning of Divine Unity, if ye be of them that apprehend and believe this truth. Be ye assured, moreover, that the works and acts of each and every one of these Manifestations of God, nay whatever pertaineth unto them, and whatsoever they may manifest in the future, are all ordained by God, and are a reflection of His Will and Purpose.”
Read in full at bahai.org →“He is the All-Glorious. 1 O thou spiritual physician! The body of humankind was afflicted with severe ills and chronic diseases, contagious maladies and prolonged fevers. Whereupon the ocean of divine favour surged, and the clouds of truth and bounty rained down upon the world of creation. The Sun of the firmament of Oneness shone forth, and vivifying breezes wafted from the meads of Singleness. The breath of the divine Messiah was diffused, the All-Knowing Physician appeared from behind the veil, and the skilled and true Healer emerged unconcealed. He prepared wholesome medicines from hidden substances, and created healing balms from concealed and treasured elements. He bestowed the panacea of unfailing efficacy, and conferred the sovereign remedy for every ill. He blended together spiritual elixirs, and created refreshing draughts made with heavenly pearls and rubies. And from the essence of Divine Unity and the quintessence of singleness, He taught and made known to us remedies that purify and tranquillize and soothe.”
Read in full at bahai.org →Questions about The Beauteous One
- Why would a healing prayer address God as 'The Beauteous One'?
- At first glance beauty might seem unrelated to healing, but the prayer appears to draw a deep connection between them. Turning toward God as the source of all beauty is a way of reorienting the heart away from suffering and toward something vast and whole. It is less about aesthetics and more about recognizing a divine quality that, by its nature, draws us upward and outward, which is itself part of what healing, in its broadest sense, can mean.
- Is 'The Beauteous One' one of the traditional ninety-nine names of God in Islam?
- The classical Islamic list of ninety-nine divine names includes Al-Jamīl, often translated as 'The Beautiful' or 'The Comely,' and Bahá'u'lláh's use of beauty-related names for God resonates with that heritage while also reflecting the distinctive spiritual vocabulary of the Bahá'í revelation. Scholars of comparative religion would be better placed than this website to map exact correspondences, and the Bahá'í institutions are the appropriate source for any authoritative interpretation of these names as used in Bahá'í scripture.
- Can saying this prayer cure my illness?
- This prayer is a deeply cherished spiritual resource, but it is not a medical treatment, and no responsible reading of the Bahá'í writings promises a specific physical cure as a result of reciting it. The Bahá'í approach to healing is holistic and practical: spiritual and material means are both encouraged, and consulting qualified physicians is strongly recommended alongside prayer. What the prayer can offer is a form of inner support, comfort, and connection to God whose outcomes remain, as the prayer itself implies, in God's hands.
Listen to, recite, and reflect on the whole prayer, its more than one hundred names of God.
Hear the Long Healing Prayer