Surah Al-Isra, The Night Journey

Surah 17 · 111 verses · revealed at Mecca

Al-Isra opens with the night journey that carried the Prophet from the sacred mosque at Mecca to the furthest mosque at Jerusalem, and it is named for it.

The event occupies one verse. What follows is a long and closely argued surah that has little to do with it directly, which is why the chapter is also known by its other name, Bani Isra'il, the Children of Israel, after the section that comes next.

Its centre is a set of commands given in sequence, and they are the nearest thing in the Qur'an to a plain code of conduct: worship none but God; be good to parents, and do not say so much as a word of complaint to them in their old age; give relatives and the traveller their due; do not waste; do not kill your children out of fear of poverty; do not go near adultery; do not take a life unjustly; do not touch an orphan's property except to improve it; keep your word; give full measure; and do not follow what you have no knowledge of.

Alongside them sits the instruction not to walk on the earth in arrogance, with the observation that you will not split the earth apart nor reach the mountains in height. It is among the few passages in the book that answer pride with something close to humour.

Towards the end the surah issues the challenge that if all people and all jinn gathered to produce something like this Qur'an they could not do it. It also gives the instruction, often quoted by translators and reciters, to recite neither too loudly nor too quietly but to seek a way between.

Surah Al-Isra on this site

Every link below has been opened and checked to make sure there is something on the other side.

Read

Listen

Download as PDF

← An-Nahl Al-Kahf →