Muqatta'at
Encyclopedia
- See Muqata'ahMuqata'ahOne of the most important topics of the Ottoman financial history is the institution of muqata'ah which functioned as an instrument in financing state expenses...
for the Ottoman instrument for financing state expenses.
Muqatta'at (Arabic: ) are unique letter combinations that begin certain sura
Sura
A sura is a division of the Qur'an, often referred to as a chapter. The term chapter is sometimes avoided, as the suras are of unequal length; the shortest sura has only three ayat while the longest contains 286 ayat...
s (chapters) of the Qur'an
Qur'an
The Quran , also transliterated Qur'an, Koran, Alcoran, Qur’ān, Coran, Kuran, and al-Qur’ān, is the central religious text of Islam, which Muslims consider the verbatim word of God . It is regarded widely as the finest piece of literature in the Arabic language...
. Muqatta'at literally means abbreviated or shortened. Their meanings remain unclear and are considered by most Muslims to be divine secrets.
They are also known as fawatih or "openers" as they form the opening verse of their respective suras. Other names include the broken, dis-joined, initial, or isolated letters of the Qur'an.
Introduction
In the Arabic language, these letters are written together like a word, but each letter is pronounced separately. Muqatta'at have been and continue to be a topic of intense research and academic discussions in IslamIslam
Islam . The most common are and . : Arabic pronunciation varies regionally. The first vowel ranges from ~~. The second vowel ranges from ~~~...
ic literature and Qur'anic studies.
A few examples of Muqatta'at
- Alif Lam Mim Sura Al BaqarahAl-BaqaraSura al-Baqarah is the second and longest chapter of the Qur'an. It is a Medinan sura and comprises 286 verses, including the single longest verse in the Qur'an...
, Sura As-SajdaAs-SajdaSurat As-Sajda is the 32nd sura of the Qur'an with 30 ayat. Surah As-Sajda has a prostration in it.According to Tafsir ibn Kathir, Imam Ahmad recorded that Jabir said,...
, etc. - Alif Lam Ra Sura YunusYunus (sura)Sura Yunus is the 10th chapter of the Qur'an with 109 verses. It is a Makkan sura. It is named after the prophet Jonah....
and Surah HudHud (sura)Sura Hud is the 11th chapter of the Qur'an with 123 verses. It is a Makkan sura.-Contents and themes:... - Alif Lam Mim Ra Sura Ar Raa'dAr-Ra'dSura Ar-Ra'd is the 13th sura of the Qur'an with 43 ayat. It is a Madinan sura.هُوَ الَّذِي يُرِيكُمُ الْبَرْقَ خَوْفًا وَطَمَعًا وَيُنْشِىءُ السَّحَابَ الثِّقَالَ...
- Ha Mim Sura Ha Mim SajdaFussilatSurat Fussilat , also known as Surat Ha Mim al-Sajda is the 41st sura of the Qur'an with 54 ayat.سَنُرِيهِمْ آَيَاتِنَا فِي الآَفَاقِ وَفِي أَنْفُسِهِمْ حَتَّى يَتَبَيَّنَ لَهُمْ أَنَّهُ الْحَقُّ أَوَلَمْ يَكْفِ بِرَبِّكَ أَنَّهُ عَلَى كُلِّ شَيْءٍ شَهِيدٌWe will henceforth keep visually exposing...
- Kaaf Ha Ya Ain Saad Surah MaryamMaryam (sura)Sura Maryam is the 19th sura of the Qur'an and is a Makkan sura with 98 ayat . It is named after Maryām, the actual name for Mary, Mother of Jesus . The popular variant of the name Maryam, Mary, is a Westernized or Anglicized version...
- Ya Seen Surah Ya-SeenYa-SeenYā Sīn - Mysterious letters :Opening with the Arabic letters "Yāʾ" and "Sīn", possibly referring to the Islamic prophet, Muhammad, since Ya also means "O" while "Sin" is often interpreted as indicating insan . The context seems to indicate this interpretation as well, as verses 3-6 specifically...
Of the 28 letters of the Arabic alphabet, exactly one half appear as muqattaat, either singly or in combinations of two, three, four or five letters. The fourteen letters are:
أ ح ر س ص ط ع ق ك ل م ن ه ي (alif, ha, ra, sin, sad, ta, ain, qaf, kaf, lam, mim, nun, ha, ya).
Context
In all but 3 of the 29 cases, these letters are almost immediately followed by mention of the Qur'anic revelation itself (the exceptions are suras 29, 30, and 68); and some argue that even these three cases should be included, since mention of the revelation is made later on in the sura. More specifically, one may note that in 8 cases the following verse begins "These are the signs...", and in another 5 it begins "The Revelation..."; another 3 begin "By the Qur'an...", and another 2 "By the Book..." Additionally, all but 3 of these suras are Meccan sura
Meccan sura
The Meccan suras are the chronologically earlier suras of the Qur'an that were, according to Islamic tradition, revealed anytime before the Hijrah . The other type of sura is the Madinan sura....
s (the exceptions are suras 2, 3, 13.)
The suras that contain these letters are: sura 2, sura 3, sura 7, sura 10, sura 11, sura 12, sura 13, sura 14, sura 15, sura 19, sura 20, sura 26, sura 27, sura 28, sura 29, sura 30, sura 31, sura 32, sura 36, sura 38, sura 40, sura 41, sura 42, sura 43, sura 44, sura 45, sura 46, sura 50, sura 68.
Laam and Meem are conjoined and both are written with prolongation sign/Mark.
One letter is written in two styles. [Refer 19:01 and 20:01] Letter 20:01 is used only in the beginning and middle of a word and that in 19:01 is not used as such. الم is also the First Ayah of Sura 3, 29, 30, 31 and 32 [total 6].
Classical opinions
Tomes have been written over the centuries on the possible meanings and probable significance ofthese 'mystical letters' as they are sometimes called. Opinions have been numerous but a consensus elusive. There is no reliable report of Muhammad
Muhammad
Muhammad |ligature]] at U+FDF4 ;Arabic pronunciation varies regionally; the first vowel ranges from ~~; the second and the last vowel: ~~~. There are dialects which have no stress. In Egypt, it is pronounced not in religious contexts...
having used such expressions in his ordinary speech, or his having thrown light on its usage in the Qur'an. And, more importantly, none of his Companions seemed to have asked him about it. This apparent lack of inquisitiveness is cited as proof that such abbreviations were well known to the Arabs of the time and were in vogue long before the advent of Islam.
One well-known opinion is that these letters stand for words or phrases related to God and His Attributes.
The famous Companions Ibn Abbas and Ibn Mas'ud are said to have favored this view, as cited by Abu Hayyan al Andalusi in his Bahr Al Muhit. As plausible as it may sound, this opinion does not find favor among other
classical commentators, because the possible combinations of letters are virtually infinite and the Attributes they represent seem to be chosen arbitrarily. For example, the translator Maulina Muhammad Ali translates these letters in his editions of the Holy Qur'an as follows:
- Alif (ا): an abbreviation for Ana (أنا, I am)
- Ḥā (ح): an abbreviation for Al-Ḥamīd (الحميد, the Praised),
- Rā (ر): an abbreviation for the Seeing,
- Sīn (س): as either an abbreviation for Man or an abbreviation for As-Samī' (السميع, the Hearing),
- Ṣād (ص): an abbreviation for As-Ṣādiq (الصادق, the Truthful),
- Ṭā (ط): as either an abbreviation for the Benignant or an interjection equivalent to O (in dialect),
- ʿAyn (ع): an abbreviation for Al-'Alīm (العليم, the Knowing),
- Qāf (ق): an abbreviation for Al-Qādir (القادر, the Almighty),
- Kāf (ك): an abbreviation for Al-Kāfi (كافي, the Sufficient),
- Lām (ل): an abbreviation for Allāh (الله, using the second letter),
- Mīm (م): as either an abbreviation for Al-'Alīm (العليم, the Knowing, using the ending letter) or for Al-Majīd (المجيد, the Glorious),
- Nūn (ن): a word meaning Inkstand,
- Hā (ه): as either an abbreviation for Al-Hādīy (الهادي, the Guide) or an abbreviation for Man (in dialect), and
- Yā (ي): an interjection equivalent to O.
Fakhr al-Din al-Razi
Fakhr al-Din al-Razi
Abu Abdullah Muhammad ibn Umar ibn al-Husayn al-Taymi al-Bakri al-Tabaristani Fakhr al-Din al-Razi , most commonly known as Fakhruddin Razi was a well-known Persian Sunni Muslim theologian and philosopher....
, a classical commentator of the Qur'an, has noted some twenty opinions regarding these letters, and mentions multiple opinions that these letters present the names of the Surahs as appointed by God. In addition, he mentions that Arabs would name things after such letters (for example, 'money' as 'ع', clouds as 'غ', and fish as 'ن').
Modern research
In 1974, an Egyptian biochemist named Rashad KhalifaRashad Khalifa
Rashad Khalifa was an Egyptian-American biochemist, closely associated with the United Submitters International. He was assassinated in 1990.-Life:Khalifa was born in Egypt on November 19, 1935...
claimed to have discovered a mathematical code in the Qur'an based on these initials and the number 19
19 (number)
19 is the natural number following 18 and preceding 20. It is a prime number.In English speech, the numbers 19 and 90 are often confused. When carefully enunciated, they differ in which syllable is stressed: 19 vs 90...
, which is mentioned in Sura 74:30 of the Qur'an. According to his claims, these initials, which prefix 29 chapters of the Qur'an, occur throughout their respective chapters in multiples of nineteen. He has noted other mathematical phenomena throughout the Qur'an, all related to what he describes as the "mathematical miracle of the Qur'an."
Amin Ahsan Islahi
Amin Ahsan Islahi
Amin Ahsan Islahi was a Pakistani Muslim scholar, famous for his Urdu exegeses of Qur'an, Tadabbur-i-Qur’an—an exegesis that he based on Hamiduddin Farahi's idea of thematic and structural coherence in the Qur'an.-Early life:...
, a renowned exegete of the Qur'an, has mentioned that since Arabs once used such letters in their poetry, it was only appropriate for the Qur'an to use that same style. He agrees with Razi and mentions that since these letters are names for Surahs, they are proper nouns. As such, they do not necessarily refer to other matters. At the same time, he cites research from Hamiduddin Farahi
Hamiduddin Farahi
Hamiduddin Farahi was a celebrated Islamic scholar of Indian subcontinent known for his groundbreaking work on the concept of Nazm, or Coherence, in the Quran...
, a Quranic scholar from the Indian subcontinent, on how these letters must be appropriately chosen according to the content and theme of the surahs. Farahi links these letters back to Hebrew alphabet
Hebrew alphabet
The Hebrew alphabet , known variously by scholars as the Jewish script, square script, block script, or more historically, the Assyrian script, is used in the writing of the Hebrew language, as well as other Jewish languages, most notably Yiddish, Ladino, and Judeo-Arabic. There have been two...
and suggests that those letters not only represented phonetic sounds but also had symbolic meanings, and Qur'an perhaps uses the same meanings when choosing the letters for surahs. For instance, in support of his opinion, he presents the letter Nun (ن), which symbolizes fish and Surah Nun mentions Prophet Jonah
Jonah
Jonah is the name given in the Hebrew Bible to a prophet of the northern kingdom of Israel in about the 8th century BC, the eponymous central character in the Book of Jonah, famous for being swallowed by a fish or a whale, depending on translation...
as 'companion of the fish'. Similarly, the letter Ta or Tuay (ط) represents a serpent and all the Surahs that begin with this letter mention the story of Prophet Moses
Moses
Moses was, according to the Hebrew Bible and Qur'an, a religious leader, lawgiver and prophet, to whom the authorship of the Torah is traditionally attributed...
and serpents.
Western scholars have only occasionally attempted to explain them. In 1973, it was proposed that the letters are the remnants of abbreviations for the Bismillah
Bismillah
There are multiple uses of Bismillah :* Bismillah is first word of the Basmala phrase of Islam.* Bismillah , born in Oruzgan, Afghanistan, in 1952...
. In 1996, Keith Massey proposed new evidence for an older theory that the "Mystery Letters" were the initials or monograms of the scribes who originally transcribed the suras . As evidence for this, he demonstrated that the letters themselves occur in a specific order, suggesting a hierarchy of importance. This idea has not yet gained wide acceptance. Other explanations have similarly failed to satisfactorily explain the letters.
Muqatta'at in the Bábí and Bahá'í Faiths
The BábBáb
Siyyid `Alí Muḥammad Shírází was the founder of Bábism, and one of three central figures of the Bahá'í Faith. He was a merchant from Shíráz, Persia, who at the age of twenty-four claimed to be the promised Qá'im . After his declaration he took the title of Báb meaning "Gate"...
, whom Bahá'ís see as the immediate forerunner of their religion, uses Muqatta'at in his Qayyúmu'l-Asmá'. He writes in his Dalá'il-i-Sab'ih (Seven Proofs) about a hadith
Hadith
The term Hadīth is used to denote a saying or an act or tacit approval or criticism ascribed either validly or invalidly to the Islamic prophet Muhammad....
from Muhammad al-Baqir
Muhammad al-Baqir
Muḥammad ibn ‘Alī al-Bāqir was the Fifth Imām to the Twelver Shi‘a and Fourth Imām to the Ismā‘īlī Shī‘a. His father was the previous Imām, ‘Alī ibn Ḥusayn, and his mother was Fatimah bint al-Hasan...
(the fifth Shia Imam
Imamah (Shi'a doctrine)
Imāmah is the Shia doctrine of religious, spiritual and political leadership of the Ummah. The Shīa believe that the A'immah are the true Caliphs or rightful successors of Muḥammad, and further that Imams are possessed of divine knowledge and authority as well as being part of the Ahl al-Bayt,...
) where it is stated that the first seven sets of Muqatta'at have a numerical value of 1267, from which the year 1844 AD (the year of the Báb's declaration) can be derived.
In 1857-58, Bahá'u'lláh
Bahá'u'lláh
Bahá'u'lláh , born ' , was the founder of the Bahá'í Faith. He claimed to be the prophetic fulfilment of Bábism, a 19th-century outgrowth of Shí‘ism, but in a broader sense claimed to be a messenger from God referring to the fulfilment of the eschatological expectations of Islam, Christianity, and...
, founder of the Bahá'í Faith
Bahá'í Faith
The Bahá'í Faith is a monotheistic religion founded by Bahá'u'lláh in 19th-century Persia, emphasizing the spiritual unity of all humankind. There are an estimated five to six million Bahá'ís around the world in more than 200 countries and territories....
, wrote his Commentary on the Isolated Letters (Tafsír-i-Hurúfát-i-Muqatta'ih, also known as Lawh-i-Áyiy-i-Núr, Tablet of the Light Verse). In it, he describes how God created the letters. A black teardrop fell down from the Primordial Pen on the "Perspicuous, Snow-white Tablet
Predestination in Islam
Qadar is divine destiny in Islam. More precisely, Qadar relates to the Knowledge and Omniscience of God about all events. Linguistically, Qadar means "measure", and when used in relation to God, means His exact knowledge of all events...
", by which the Point was created. The Point then turned into an Alif
Aleph
* Aleph or Alef is the first letter of the Semitic abjads descended from Proto-Canaanite, Arabic alphabet, Phoenician alphabet, Hebrew alphabet, Syriac alphabet-People:*Aleph , an Italo disco artist and alias of Dave Rodgers...
(vertical stroke), which was again transformed, after which the Muqatta'at appeared. These letters were then differentiated, separated and then again gathered and linked together, appearing as the “names and attributes” of creation. Bahá'u'lláh gives various interpretations of the letters "alif, lam, mim", mostly relating to Allah, trusteeship (wilaya) and the prophethood (nubuwwa) of Muhammad. He emphasizes the central role of the alif in all the worlds of God.