No. 55 of 124 · A Name of God · The Long Healing Prayer
The Withholding One
Sometimes the most profound act of trust is accepting that God's hand, even when it holds back, holds us.
I call on Thee O Beneficent One, O Withholding One, O Creating 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 · Withholding
from “withhold”: 1. To hold back; to restrain; to keep from action. Withhold, O sovereign prince, your hasty hand From knitting league with him. Spenser. 2. To retain; to keep back; not to grant; as, to withhold assent to a proposition. Forbid who will, none shall from me withhold Longer thy offered good. Milton. 3. To keep; to maintain; to retain. [Obs.] To withhold it the more easily in heart. Chaucer.
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 Withholding 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.
At first glance, 'The Withholding One' can feel like a difficult name to sit with. We are drawn naturally to names that speak of giving, pouring out, or bestowing, so why would we call upon a God whose name acknowledges the act of holding back? Yet this name carries a quiet depth that opens up the more honestly we look at our own lives. Withholding, in divine terms, is not absence or indifference. It is a form of knowing: the kind a surgeon exercises when deciding what to cut and what to leave untouched.
Many of the world's wisdom traditions recognize that unlimited giving is not always wisdom. A parent who gives a child everything that child demands is not necessarily a loving parent. The name 'The Withholding One' points toward a God who sees the whole arc of a life, not just this moment of pain or longing, and whose restraint is itself a kind of care. What we do not receive may be withheld for reasons we cannot yet see, or may simply not be ours to receive in the way we imagined.
This name also quietly dismantles the notion that prayer is a mechanism for extracting outcomes from the universe. To address God as The Withholding One is to acknowledge, before we even finish the sentence, that God's answer might be 'not this, not now, not in this form.' Far from being a discouraging thought, many who have prayed through loss or illness find this name strangely freeing, it relocates the conversation from bargaining to relationship, from demand to surrender.
Calling on The Withholding One for healing
When we are sick, or watching someone we love suffer, the question 'why is this not being taken away?' can feel overwhelming. Calling on The Withholding One in that moment is not an act of resignation. It is an act of radical honesty, bringing our confusion and grief directly into the prayer rather than smoothing it over with platitudes. You might sit with this name and simply acknowledge, out loud or in the quiet of your heart, that you do not understand, and that you are choosing to trust anyway. That choice, however fragile, is itself a form of spiritual healing.
It is worth remembering that healing, physical, emotional, and spiritual, is held entirely in God's wisdom, not guaranteed by any prayer or formula. If you or someone you care for is facing illness, please do seek the guidance of qualified medical professionals; that, too, is understood in this tradition as part of how healing comes to us. The Long Healing Prayer is not a substitute for good medical care. Rather, it is a companion to it, a way of placing the whole situation, including its uncertainties and its possible outcomes, into hands far wiser and more patient than our own.
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Living the Word
Applying The Withholding One in your life
A name of God is a virtue to grow into. Where is The Withholding 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
“It is incumbent upon everyone to seek medical treatment and to follow the doctor’s instructions, for this is in compliance with the divine ordinance, but, in reality, He Who giveth healing is God.”
Read in full at bahai.org →“15.3O handmaid of God! The prayers which were revealed to ask for healing apply both to physical and spiritual healing. Recite them, then, to heal both the soul and the body. If healing is right for the patient, it will certainly be granted; but for some ailing persons, healing would only be the cause of other ills, and therefore wisdom doth not permit an affirmative answer to the prayer. 15.4O handmaid of God! The power of the Holy Spirit healeth both physical and spiritual ailments. Acquiring Divine Virtues”
Read in full at bahai.org →“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 →Questions about The Withholding One
- Why would a loving God be called 'The Withholding One'?
- This name invites us to expand our understanding of love and care beyond simple giving. Divine wisdom, as reflected in the Bahá'í writings, encompasses the full picture of what serves a person's true wellbeing, not just their immediate comfort or desire. Withholding in this sense is not cold or punitive; it is the restraint of a knowing and compassionate intelligence. The name asks us to trust what we cannot fully see.
- Does reciting this name or the Long Healing Prayer guarantee that I will be healed?
- No, and the Bahá'í writings are gently honest about this. Healing, whether physical or spiritual, rests in God's wisdom, and that wisdom may not always align with what we are asking for in a given moment. The prayer is a genuine and powerful act of turning toward God, but it is not a formula that compels a specific outcome. Please also consult qualified medical professionals for physical illness, that practical step is itself encouraged in this tradition.
- How is 'The Withholding One' different from a God who simply doesn't answer prayer?
- The distinction lies in intentionality and relationship. A God who does not answer prayer is absent or indifferent; The Withholding One is actively present and making a considered choice. To name God this way is to affirm that God is engaged with our situation, aware of our need, and, even in not granting what we ask, responding to us. It transforms unanswered prayer from abandonment into mystery held within relationship.
Listen to, recite, and reflect on the whole prayer, its more than one hundred names of God.
Hear the Long Healing Prayer