No. 103 of 124 · A Name of God · The Long Healing Prayer
The Beauty
When we call on God as 'The Beauty,' we turn toward a light that does not fade, a perfection the soul recognizes even when words fall short.
I call on Thee O Glory, O Beauty, O Bountiful 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 · Beauty
1. An assemblage or graces or properties pleasing to the eye, the ear, the intellect, the æsthetic faculty, or the moral sense. Beauty consists of a certain composition of color and figure, causing delight in the beholder. Locke. The production of beauty by a multiplicity of symmetrical parts uniting in a consistent whole. Wordsworth. The old definition of beauty, in the Roman school, was, "multitude in unity;" and there is no doubt that such is the principle of beauty. Coleridge. 2. A particular grace, feature, ornament, or excellence; anything beautiful; as, the beauties of nature. 3. A beautiful person, esp. …
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 Beauty” 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.
Beauty, in most of our daily experience, is fragile. A sunset dims, a face ages, a melody ends. But the name 'The Beauty', as a name of God, points toward something of an entirely different order: a beauty that is not a property of any passing thing but the very source from which all loveliness in the world derives. To invoke God by this name is to acknowledge that whatever draws us toward goodness, toward light, toward one another in tenderness, is a reflection of something inexhaustible at the heart of reality.
In the Bahá'í tradition, this name carries particular weight because Bahá'u'lláh himself is often referred to as the 'Abhá Beauty', Abhá being a superlative form meaning 'Most Glorious' or 'Most Luminous.' The name is not merely poetic decoration; it carries a theological claim that the Divine chooses to reveal itself in a form the human heart can love, not only fear or stand in awe before. There is an intimacy in beauty that awe alone does not always invite. Beauty draws near; it calls the soul rather than commanding it.
When the prayer places 'The Beauty' alongside 'The Glory' and 'The Bountiful One' in a single breath, we sense how these names reinforce each other. Glory might suggest majesty at a distance; bounty suggests generosity flowing outward; beauty is the quality that makes us willing, even eager, to receive what is being offered. Together they sketch a God who is not remote or arbitrary but radiant, generous, and lovely in a way the soul can find its way home by.
Calling on The Beauty for healing
There is something quietly powerful about calling on God as Beautiful when we ourselves feel broken or diminished by illness, grief, or exhaustion. It reorients the gaze. Instead of staring only at what is damaged or fearful within us, we are invited to look toward a source of wholeness that exists independent of our current condition. This is not denial of what we are suffering, it is more like opening a window in a dark room. The light does not erase the room, but it changes everything about how we can see and move within it.
When you recite this line of the Long Healing Prayer and pause on the word 'Beauty,' you might let yourself simply rest in the recognition that you are turning toward something worthy of love, not only petition. Healing of any kind, physical, emotional, or spiritual, unfolds in ways we cannot fully predict or control, and the Bahá'í writings encourage us to trust both prayer and the care of skilled physicians, holding the two together rather than setting them against each other. What calling on The Beauty can do is soften the rigidity of fear and remind the heart that it is reaching toward a reality that is, at its core, radiant and good, and that this reaching is itself a form of restoration, whatever the outcome.
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Living the Word
Applying The Beauty in your life
A name of God is a virtue to grow into. Where is The Beauty 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
“11.1That Assembly resteth in the sheltering shade of the Lord of all bounties, and it is my hope that, as beseemeth that body, it will be favoured and invigorated by the breathings of the Holy Spirit, and that day by day ye will love God in ever greater measure, and become more tightly bound to the Beauty that abideth forever, to Him Who is the Light of the world. For love of God and spiritual attraction do cleanse and purify the human heart and dress and adorn it with the spotless garment of holiness; and once the heart is entirely attached to the Lord, and bound over to the Blessed Perfection, then will the grace of God be revealed. 11.2This love is not of the body but completely of the soul. And those souls whose inner being is lit by the love of God are even as spreading rays of light, and they shine out like stars of holiness in a pure and crystalline sky. For true love, real love, is the love for God, and this is sanctified beyond the notions and imaginings of men.”
Read in full at bahai.org →“6.2O thou seeker after the Kingdom! Every divine Manifestation is the very life of the world, and the skilled physician of each ailing soul. The world of man is sick, and that competent Physician knoweth the cure, arising as He doth with teachings, counsels and admonishments that are the remedy for every pain, the healing balm to every wound. It is certain that the wise physician can diagnose his patient’s needs at any season, and apply the cure. Wherefore, relate thou the Teachings of the Abhá Beauty to the urgent needs of this present day, and thou wilt see that they provide an instant remedy for the ailing body of the world. Indeed, they are the elixir that bringeth eternal health.”
Read in full at bahai.org →“10.2To sum it up, the Ancient Beauty was ever, during His sojourn in this transitory world, either a captive bound with chains, or living under a sword, or subjected to extreme suffering and torment, or held in the Most Great Prison. Because of His physical weakness, brought on by His afflictions, His blessed body was worn away to a breath; it was light as a cobweb from long grieving. And His reason for shouldering this heavy load and enduring all this anguish, which was even as an ocean that hurleth its waves to high heaven—His reason for putting on the heavy iron chains and for becoming the very embodiment of utter resignation and meekness, was to lead every soul on earth to concord, to fellow feeling, to oneness; to make known amongst all peoples the sign of the singleness of God, so that at last the primal oneness deposited at the heart of all created things would bear its destined fruit, and the splendour of “No difference canst thou see in the creation of the God of Mercy” would cast abroad its rays.”
Read in full at bahai.org →Questions about The Beauty
- Why would a healing prayer invoke God as 'The Beauty' rather than a name like 'The Healer'?
- The Long Healing Prayer actually does invoke God as the Healing One in the very same line, but pairing it with Beauty is significant. Beauty is the quality that draws the soul willingly toward God rather than simply commanding its obedience, and that willing, loving orientation may be part of what makes prayer a genuine encounter rather than a recited formula. The name invites the whole person, not just the frightened or ailing part, into the act of turning toward the Divine.
- Is 'The Beauty' the same as 'Abhá Beauty,' the title used for Bahá'u'lláh?
- They share the same Arabic root, bahá, which carries meanings of glory, splendor, and beauty. In the Long Healing Prayer, it functions as a name of God in the broadest sense, while 'Abhá Beauty' is a title specifically used to refer to Bahá'u'lláh as a Manifestation of God. The relationship is close and intentional, but interpreting precisely how they relate is a matter the Bahá'í Faith leaves to its authorized interpreters.
- Can focusing on God as Beautiful actually help with physical illness?
- The Bahá'í writings encourage both prayer and the consultation of qualified medical professionals, these are seen as complementary, not competing, paths. Whether and how spiritual orientation affects physical health is something medical science continues to explore, and we would not want to make promises that go beyond what is honestly known. What we can say is that calling on God as Beautiful can shift the inner landscape of a person who is suffering, and that shift in itself is not nothing, it is the beginning of hope, and hope has its own quiet medicine.
Listen to, recite, and reflect on the whole prayer, its more than one hundred names of God.
Hear the Long Healing Prayer