Glossary: A
A B D F G H I J K L M N Q R S T U W Y Z
abrār
Abrār is the plural of barr, from birr meaning iḥsān (excellence, good); a barr does good because it is good, without desiring any reward, appreciation or recognition, and patiently opposes his ego to fulfill it. → Read at 76:5
ʿaḍḍ
Al-Rāghib: ʿaḍḍ means biting with the teeth; biting the hands is an expression for remorse and regret, as people bite their fingers when they are regretful. → Read at 25:27
adhā
Superlative of dahāʾ, a grave misfortune with no escape; amarr is the superlative of marārah, the opposite of sweet. → Read at 54:46
ʿadl
The act of fairness, the opposite of oppression. Al-Rāghib: ʿadālah and muʿādalah imply balance and equivalence; ʿadl is used for things perceived intellectually, like judgments, and refers to the distribution of rights equally. → Read at 16:90
ʿadn
ʿAdn means “stability, establishment, permanence,” so the Gardens of Eden are eternal and everlasting gardens. → Read at 98:8
ʿadw
Al-Rāghib explicitly states that its root meaning is passing, a meaning that runs through all its derivatives. Al-Qāmūs: lā taʿdu ʿaynāka ʿanhum () means do not let your eyes pass them and miss them while you desire the adornments of this world's life. → Read at 18:28
ʿafw
Al-Rāghib: ʿafw is intending to take something; ʿafawtu ʿanhu is intending to efface someone's sin; ṣafḥ is relinquishing blame, which is superior to ʿafw, since one may pardon without relinquishing blame. → Read at 64:14
aḥad
Aḥad is applied only to something not subject to any plurality, externally or mentally, so it is not used for counting, unlike wāḥid; it conveys an affirmative sense only with reference to God. → Read at 112:1
ʿahd
- () Al-Rāghib: to preserve and observe something under all circumstances; hence it is used for religious commands and obligations, for covenants and agreements between two sides, and for vows and oaths. → Read
- () Al-Rāghib: the preservation and care of something over time; a binding agreement requiring observance is called an ʿahd. → Read
- () A covenant is apparently any contract made with another, verbally or practically; observing it is abiding by it and not violating it. → Read
ahl al-bayt
As used here in the Qur'an, Ahl al-Bayt is a technical term referring specifically to five people, the Prophet, ʿAlī, Fāṭimah, Ḥasan and Ḥusayn, and may not be applied to anyone else, even the Prophet's nearest kin. → Read at 33:33
aḥqāb
Aḥqāb means "consecutive periods of time and long ages, without any specified limit"; the specific durations suggested for each ḥuqb have no support in the Qur'an and are not established in the lexicons. → Read at 78:23
ajal
- () The term, meaning the agreed time or its end; apparently 'ajal' by itself in the sense of the end of an agreed time is a common usage, shortened from 'the settled term.' Al-Rāghib: the term fixed for man's life is called al-ajal, its real sense being the completion of the term. → Read
- () Ajal (time) is the deadline for the repayment of a loan or the like, although it can also be used for the entire duration of a loan; the first meaning is more common. God's time is the deadline He has set for mankind to encounter Him. → Read
- () There are two kinds of ajal (end, term): one fixed and specified (musammá) and one that is not; belief postpones a person’s death to the specified end, the longest term assigned to each person, while persistent disbelief hastens the other end. → Read
ajal musammā
A "specified term" is the point at which the existence of a thing ends; here it is the term of the whole universe, alluding to the Day of Resurrection. → Read at 46:3
ajr
Ajr is a recompense given to the doer of a deed. Unlike ujra (wage), which is only worldly, ajr covers recompense in this world and the Hereafter; unlike jazāʾ, which can be good or bad, ajr is used only for good and beneficial things. → Read at 29:27
akhbār
"Reports" are deeds insofar as they emanate from their doers and are a report about them; God's testing makes the servants' condition apparent, an act of knowledge external to the Divine Essence, not new knowledge for Him. → Read at 47:31
āl
Someone closely related to a man. Al-Rāghib: it is said to be an altered form of al-ahl, but unlike ahl it is annexed only to proper names of rational beings and to great and noble personalities. So the āl of Abraham and of ʿImrān are their closely related family members and those exclusively attached to them. → Read at 3:33
aʿlá
Aʿlá means “the highest of the high who dominates everything”; it describes your Lord, not name, and justifies the command to glorify. → Read at 87:1
ʿālamīn
Al-ʿālamīn is the plural of al-ʿālam, which literally means "what one is known with"; it is used for the whole universe, for each genus or species, and for a class within a species; here it most appropriately means the worlds (various groups) of human beings and jinn. → Read at 1:2
Allāh
- () Allāh was originally al-Ilāh, derived from alaha (he worshiped) or aliha/waliha (he was bewildered), meaning the One who is worshiped, or the One about whom minds are bewildered; it has become the proper name of God. → Read
- () The name Allāh was originally al-ilāh, an attribute that signifies being worshipped, which then became a proper noun through repeated usage as a name, so that it is now itself qualified by attributes. → Read
- () The Divine Name placed at the start of each of the three verses is a marker for the Divine Essence, the confluence of all attributes of perfection on which all the names are predicated. → Read
amad
- () Al-Rāghib: al-amad (duration) and al-abad (eternity) are almost identical, but abad is used for an unlimited, unrestricted time span, while amad implies an unknown but limited duration and refers to an end. → Read
- () Al-Rāghib: amad is a period of time with its end in mind, whereas zamān is general, encompassing beginning and end. → Read
ʿamal
- () Al-Rāghib: ʿamal is the voluntary action (fiʿl) of a living being, so it is more specific than fiʿl, which is also used for involuntary actions of animals and inanimate objects. → Read
- () Al-Rāghib: ʿamila (doing), unlike faʿala, is usually used for intentional actions aimed at a goal, so not usually for animals or inanimate things, and it is associated with good and evil, unlike faʿala. → Read
amānah
- () Amānah is originally a verbal noun (entrustment) but sometimes refers to the thing entrusted, such as money, which is the sense meant here; the plural amānāt apparently refers to the different types of trust among people. → Read
- () A trust is a thing entrusted to a person to look after and then return to the one who deposited it. The trust in this verse is the divine wilāyah and the perfection of the attribute of servitude, which results from knowledge of God and acting rightly. → Read
amr
- () Khalq is originally measurement, putting things together to define the bounds of something new, and in religion origination ex nihilo; amr means both an affair or matter (plural umūr) and a command (plural awāmir), and it is like a medium connecting the one who commands and the one commanded, so it is ascribed to both. → Read
- () Amr means "matter." Although () speaks of God's "word" and might suggest that amr means the creational word "be!", the intent of the verse is to show how easy it is for God to create, not what word He creates with; so "word" there is to be taken as "matter," not "matter" as "word." → Read
- () Command here is the opposite of prohibition, not "affair": a creative (takwīnī) command, not a legislative one, namely the word "Be" (). → Read
- () The decree descending among the heavens and the earth is the divine creative command "Be," which descends through each heaven to the earthly realm, manifesting whatever is intended: creation, sustenance, life, death, honor, or humiliation. → Read
- () On that day God will be the sole possessor of al-amr; it is said that amr here is the singular of awāmir (commands) pertaining to an authoritative sovereign, the antonym of nahy (prohibition), rather than shaʾn (matter, affair). → Read
- () Amr may be the divine command defined in , “Be,” from which the descent of the angels and the Spirit emanates, or all events in the world, which they descend to manage. → Read
anfāl
The plural of nafal, meaning an excess or abundance of something. Hence it is used for fayʾ, ownerless properties (mountaintops, abandoned houses, towns left without heirs) that belong to God and His Messenger, and also for the spoils of war, since they exceed the aim of battle, which is vanquishing the enemy. → Read at 8:1
anfus
The souls that God takes at death are the spirits connected to the bodies, not the spirits and bodies together; the soul is taken from the body in the sense that its connection with the body is severed so it can no longer control it. → Read at 39:42
ʿanwah
ʿAnwah means submissiveness before the domination of the Dominator, which will be the state of everything except God on the Day of Resurrection when divine authority is manifested. → Read at 20:111
ʿaqabah
ʿAqabah means “a rugged steep incline that is difficult to pass,” and iqtiḥām means laborious embarking; venturing the defile refers to charitable expenditure that is difficult for the donor, such as freeing a slave. → Read at 90:11
ʿaqd
To tie two things together so firmly that they are very difficult to separate, like a rope tied to a rope; first used for the physical, then metaphorically for abstract ties such as offer and acceptance, so that it covers all covenants and agreements. In () the plural al-ʿuqūd, with the article, encompasses everything that can be called a covenant, including all the religious covenants God has taken from His servants. → Read at 5:1
ʿaql
- () Al-ʿaql, the maṣdar of ʿaqala (he understood), denotes perfect comprehension; it is that by which man differentiates between good and bad and discerns truth from falsehood, and it is the man himself who perceives, not one of his faculties like memory or sight. → Read
- () Intellect is distinguishing good from bad and beneficial from harmful; perhaps what is meant is its aim, acting on what it requires. → Read
aqnā
From qunya, lasting and durable possessions such as a home, an orchard, or an animal, mentioned after wealth (aghnā) to call attention to their value. → Read at 53:48
aʿrāb
Al-Rāghib: the plural of ʿArab (the descendants of Ishmael), which over time came to denote the desert-dwellers, the Bedouins. → Read at 9:97
ʿarḍ
"Offering" is to show that nothing prevents one thing from being received by another; it is a relation in which either party can be the one offered to, so the Fire may be offered to the faithless or they to the Fire. → Read at 46:20
arjāʾ
Al-Rāghib: rajā is the edge of a well or of the sky, its side, plural arjāʾ; malak (angel) is used for singular and plural, here plural. → Read at 69:17
ʿarsh
- () The seat on which a king sits, sometimes used metaphorically for the station of sovereignty, dominion and majesty. Al-Rāghib: its original meaning is something roofed, and a ruler's seat is called ʿarsh because it is elevated. → Read
- () The Throne is the station from which emanate the divine edicts and commands that govern the cosmos; the angels surrounding it are those who execute God's will by His command. → Read
- () ʿArsh means “a king’s throne,” and Lord of the Throne is metaphorical for God’s sovereignty; Majīd means possessor of majd, “spiritual greatness and magnificence,” amounting to perfection in essence and attributes. → Read
asfal sāfilīn
The lowest of the low refers to the most degenerate condition, the worst of those who have plunged into wretchedness, that is, misery and divine punishment, not old age. → Read at 95:5
ashrāṭ
Plural of sharṭ, "mark"; the original meaning of sharṭ is that upon which the existence of another thing depends, so the portents of the Hour are the signs pointing to it. → Read at 47:18
ashudd
Attaining maturity (ashudd) refers to the stage of life in which a human being's strength and powers intensify and he becomes strong and robust, generally reached by about eighteen; istiwāʾ means straightness, stability and firmness. → Read at 28:14
athārah
Al-Rāghib: a verbal noun meaning narration or transmission, originally to follow something's tracks; in the verse it has the sense of a passive participle, "a thing transmitted," so "a trace of knowledge" is knowledge that has been handed down. → Read at 46:4
athqāl
Athqāl is the plural of thaqal (a traveler’s provisions) or thiql (load, burden); it most likely means the dead coming out of their graves, then both the dead and the earth’s treasures. → Read at 99:2
atqá
The wariest is meant comparatively: of all forms of wariness, the highest is holding God in regard and spending one’s wealth for His sake, so the verse is general and not restricted to one individual. → Read at 92:17
ʿatw
Al-Rāghib: to defy is to shrink from obedience, close in meaning to insolence. → Read at 51:44
ʿawdh
ʿAwdh means “guarding oneself and avoiding a harm by resorting to someone who can repel it,” and falaq, from falq (splitting), commonly means dawn, which cleaves the darkness. → Read at 113:1
awlawiyyah
Entitlement means that when there is a choice between two or more sides, preference is given to one in particular, which is called more entitled (awlā); so whatever a believer feels towards himself, the Prophet is more entitled to it than the believer's own self. → Read at 33:6
awwāb
al-awwal wa al-ākhir
Because His power encompasses all things from every angle, He is before whatever is supposed first, after whatever is last, more manifest than the manifest and more hidden than the hidden, in absolute terms; these are not temporal or spatial. → Read at 57:3
āyah
- () Sign; it can refer to ideas or external entities, but here it definitely refers to the constituent parts of the divine speech revealed to the Prophet. → Read
- () First, the indicators that evidence an event, such as remaining traces; second, a sign testifying to the believers to the truth of the divine warning. Tawassum is discerning and passing from the outward appearance of things to their reality. → Read
ayd
Power or blessing; both meanings fit "We built the sky with ayd." → Read at 51:47
ʿayn al-yaqīn
ʿAyn al-yaqīn means “certitude itself”: they will surely see hell with absolute certainty on the Day of Resurrection. → Read at 102:7
ʿayy
Al-Rāghib: exhaustion means being unable to accomplish some speech or action. The first creation is the present natural order, the new creation the Hereafter. → Read at 50:15
ayyām allāh
God's days are the days on which God will judge and hold authority, such as the day of a person's death, the barzakh, the Resurrection, or the days on which He punishes people by wiping them out in this world. → Read at 45:14
ʿazm
- () According to al-Rāghib, ʿazm means to set one's heart upon accomplishing something. Patience (ṣabr), restraining oneself from something, is a form of ʿazm insofar as one remains steadfast upon a goal so long as one's heart is set upon it. → Read
- () "Resolute" here is either patience, or resolution to fulfill the pledge taken from the prophets, or resolution (ʿazīmah) in the sense of governance and law (sharīʿah). → Read