Al-Quddus
The Holy
Exalted and Glorious
He is Allah beside Whom none has the right to be worshiped but He the King, the Holy, the One Free From all Defects, the Giver of Security, the Watcher over His creatures, the All-Mighty, the Compeller, the Supreme. (59:23)
Whatsoever is in the heavens and whatsoever is in the earth glorifies Allah, the King of everything, the Holy, the All-Mighty, the All-Wise. (62:1)
This name is another attribute of Allah which conveys the meaning, the sense of purity, and the freedom from all sorts of drawbacks, faults, flaws, defects, and blemishes. Allah is the Perfect, Holy, Supreme Being Who will remain forever. Allah is the Perfect Holy because He is above all human weakness.
Allah will liberate from anxiety the hearts who repeat this name every day 100 times.
Al-Quddus is the Apparent – free from every defect and shortcoming, and is beyond thought forms or the grasp of the mind. So exalt Him beyond shortcomings or defects, and make your belief be in Him as He says, “There is nothing like unto Him.”
Allah Allah Allah
From: The Meanings of the Names of Our Lord by Shaykh Muhammad Sa’id al-Jamal ar-Rifa’i Head of the Higher Sufi Council in Jerusalem and the Holy Land Teacher at the Dome of the Rock (al-Aqsa)
AL-QUDDUS
He is the most pure one, devoid of all blemish, shortcoming, weakness, heedlessness, and error.
Al-Quddus is the equivalent of the attribute mukha-lafatun lil-hawadith. He is the Creator “bearing no resemblance to the created.” This is one of the five qualities that indicate the non-resemblance of Allah to anything.
Al-Quddus is the unique purity that is Allah’s, whereby His essence. His attributes, His names, His words, His actions, His justice, are devoid of all blemish. He bears no resemblance, in any of His attributes or actions, to even the most perfect of His creatures. Even the most perfect creatures have something lacking in their essence, attributes, actions, judgments, or words. For one thing, they are temporal, while Allah the most perfect, the most pure, is eternal, free of time and place. Before existence there was no time and no place, but Allah existed.
The believers who understand and feel this divine purity will wish to praise Allah for His perfection (taqdis) and will remember to avoid attributing any qualities that are defective or any temporal imperfect state to Allah (tasbih).
To find the feeling of al-Quddus in ourselves, we should protect our understanding and knowledge of things form being limited to observations and impressions received through the senses, for they will not take us past the animal realm. In addition, the knowledge fit for human beings should not be a product of our imagination. One should work on cleansing one’s faith by eliminating doubts. Faith is a whole: the existence of a single doubt blemishes it. One should try to cleanse one’s devotions and prayers by sincerity. Sincerity in prayer is to pray to Allah for Allah’s sake, for no other purpose, seeking no other benefit. Otherwise the prayer itself becomes shirk, the unforgivable sin of associating equals with Allah. One should try to cleanse one’s heart by abandoning bad habits: bad habits are like garbage and thorns, and our hearts are Allah’s houses.
‘Abd al-Quddus is the one whose heart is cleansed and purified, and contains nothing but Allah. A heart filled with Allah is safe from everything else. The manifestation of the name Ya Quddus, the Most Pure, can only appear in the pure heart described by Allah in the Holy Tradition: “I do not fit into the heavens and the earth, but I fit within the heart of my faithful servant.”
If someone with a pure heart recites ya Quddus 100 times a day, his heart will become free of all the thoughts and concerns by which we cause ourselves trouble, worry, and pain.
From: The Name & the Named by Shaykh Tosun Bayrak al-Jerrahi al-Halveti