Surah Al-Ikhlas, Sincerity

Surah 112 · 4 verses · revealed at Mecca

Al-Ikhlas is four verses long — about fifteen words — and it is probably the most recited surah in the Qur'an after Al-Fatihah.

It is also unlike almost everything else in the book. There is no story in it. No command, no prohibition, no promise and no warning. The Prophet is not mentioned, nor is any other person, nor any place or event. It does one thing only: it states what God is and is not. He is One. He is the one to whom all turn and who needs no one. He does not beget and was not begotten. There is nothing comparable to Him.

The occasion recorded for its revelation is that people asked the Prophet about God's lineage — who His father was, what He was made of, the sort of question you would ask about any of the gods then worshipped in Mecca. The answer given was this surah, which does not describe God in those terms at all but removes the frame the question was built on.

There is a report in Sahih Bukhari, sound and undisputed, that this surah is equal to a third of the Qur'an. Commentators have understood that in terms of subject rather than reward: the Qur'an deals with belief, with law, and with what has gone before, and Al-Ikhlas contains the whole of the first in four lines.

Its placement is the usual disagreement — most authorities call it Meccan, a minority Medinan, and some have said it was revealed twice.

Surah Al-Ikhlas on this site

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Surah Al-Ikhlas, Sincerity

Surah Al-Ikhlas on this site

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