Back 
BookmarksTranslation settings
Arabic font settings
English font settings
Reset global font settings
Surah 111. Al-Masad
Qur'an
Translation
IN THE NAME OF GOD, THE MOST GRACIOUS, THE DISPENSER OF GRACE:1
- Mohammad Asad
According to most of the authorities, this invocation (which occurs at the beginning of every surah with the exception of surah 9) constitutes an integral part of "The Opening" and is, therefore, numbered as verse 1. In all other instances, the invocation "in the name of God" precedes the surah as such, and is not counted among its verses. - Both the divine epithets rahman and rahim are derived from the noun rahmah, which signifies "mercy", "compassion", "loving tenderness" and, more comprehensively, "grace". From the very earliest times, Islamic scholars have endeavoured to define the exact shades of meaning which differentiate the two terms. The best and simplest of these explanations is undoubtedly the one advanced by Ibn al-Qayyim (as quoted in Manar I,48): the term rahman circumscribes the quality of abounding grace inherent in, and inseparable from, the concept of God's Being, whereas rahim expresses the manifestation of that grace in, and its effect upon, His creation - in other words, an aspect of His activity.
In the name of Allah, the Compassionate, the Merciful.
- Muhammad Farooq-i-Azam Malik
In the Name of Allah- the Most Compassionate, Most Merciful.
- Mustafa Khattab
In the name of Allah, the Beneficent, the Merciful
- Marmaduke Pickthall
In the name of Allah Most Gracious Most Merciful. 19
- Abdullah Yusuf Ali
The Arabic words "Rahman" and "Rahim" translated "Most Gracious" and "Most Merciful" are both intensive forms referring to different aspects of God's attribute of Mercy. The Arabic intensive is more suited to express God's attributes than the superlative degree in English. The latter implies a comparison with other beings, or with other times or places, while there is no being like unto God, and He is independent of Time and Place. Mercy may imply pity, long-suffering, patience, and forgiveness, all of which the sinner needs and God Most Merciful bestows in abundant measure. But there is a Mercy that goes before even the need arises, the Grace which is ever watchful, and flows from God Most Gracious to all His creatures, protecting the, preserving them, guiding them, and leading them to clearer light and higher life. For this reason the attribute Rahman (Most Gracious) is not applied to any but God, but the attribute Rahim (Merciful), is a general term, and may also be applied to Men. To make us contemplate these boundless gifts of God, the formula: "In the name of God Most Gracious, Most Merciful": is placed before every Sura of the Qur-an (except the ninth), and repeated at the beginning of every act by the Muslim who dedicates his life to God, and whose hope is in His Mercy.
No translation has been selected yet. Please click on the (Compare) link at the top and enable the translations of your choice.
DOOMED are the hands of him of the glowing countenance1 and doomed is he!
- Mohammad Asad
The real name of this uncle of the Prophet was 'Abd al-'Uzza. He was popularly nicknamed Abu Lahab (lit., "He of the Flame") on account of his beauty, which was most notably expressed in his glowing countenance (Baghawi, on the authority of Muqatil; Zamakhshari and Razi passim in their comments on the above verse; Fath al-Bari VIII, 599). Since this nickname, or kunyah, appears to have been applied to him even before the advent of Islam, there is no reason to suppose that it had a pejorative significance. - The expression "hands" in the above clause is, in accordance with classical Arabic usage, a metonym for "power", nludst the great influence which Abu Lahab wielded.
Perish the hands of Abu Lahab! And perish he!
- Muhammad Farooq-i-Azam Malik
May the hands of Abu Lahab perish, and he 'himself' perish!
- Mustafa Khattab
The power of Abu Lahab will perish, and he will perish.
- Marmaduke Pickthall
Perish the hands of the Father of Flame! Perish he! 6294
- Abdullah Yusuf Ali
Abu Lahab, "Father of Flame", was the nick-name of an uncle of the holy Prophet, from his fiery hot temper and his ruddy complexion. He was one of the most inveterate enemies of early Islam. When the holy Prophet called together the Quraish and his own kith and kin to come and listen to his preaching and his warning against the sins of his people, the "Father of Flame" flared up and cursed the holy Prophet, saying "Perdition to thee!" According to the English saying, "the causeless curse will not come". His words were futile, but his power and strength were equally futile. The star of Islam rose higher and higher every day, and its persecuters dwindled in strength and power. Many of the leaders of persecution perished at Badr, and Abu Lahab himself perished a week after Badr, consumed with grief and his own fiery passions. Verse 3 was prophetic of his end in this very life, though it also refers to the Hereafter.
No translation has been selected yet. Please click on the (Compare) link at the top and enable the translations of your choice.
What will his wealth avail him, and all that he has gained?
- Mohammad Asad
His wealth and whatever he earned did not avail him anything.
- Muhammad Farooq-i-Azam Malik
Neither his wealth nor 'worldly' gains will benefit him.
- Mustafa Khattab
His wealth and gains will not exempt him.
- Marmaduke Pickthall
No profit to him from all his wealth and all his gains!
- Abdullah Yusuf Ali
No translation has been selected yet. Please click on the (Compare) link at the top and enable the translations of your choice.
[In the life to come] he shall have to endure a fire fiercely glowing,2
- Mohammad Asad
The expression nar dhat lahab is a subtle play upon the meaning of the nickname Abu Lahab.
Soon he shall be burnt in a flaming fire (a pun on the meaning of Abu Lahab, "father of flames"),
- Muhammad Farooq-i-Azam Malik
He will burn in a flaming Fire,
- Mustafa Khattab
He will be plunged in flaming fire,
- Marmaduke Pickthall
Burnt soon will he be in a Fire of blazing Flame!
- Abdullah Yusuf Ali
No translation has been selected yet. Please click on the (Compare) link at the top and enable the translations of your choice.
together with his wife, that carrier of evil tales,3
- Mohammad Asad
Lit., "carrier of firewood", a well-known idiomatic expression denoting one who surreptitiously carries evil tales and slander from one person to another "so as to kindle the flames of hatred between them" (Zamakhshari; see also 'Ikrimah, Mujahid and Qatadah, as quoted by Tabari). The woman's name was Arwa umm Jamil bint Harb ibn Umayyah; she was a sister of Abu Sufyan and, hence, a paternal aunt of Mu'awiyah, the founder of the Umayyad dynasty. Her hatred of Muhammad and his followers was so intense that she would often, under the cover of darkness, scatter thorns before the Prophet's house with a view to causing him hurt; and she employed her great eloquence in persistently slandering him and his message.
and his wife, the carrier of crackling fire wood,
- Muhammad Farooq-i-Azam Malik
and 'so will' his wife, the carrier of 'thorny' kindling,1
- Mustafa Khattab
Since she used to carry thorny branches and throw them in the way of the Prophet (ﷺ), she will be carrying firewood in Hell.
And his wife, the wood carrier,
- Marmaduke Pickthall
His wife shall carry the (crackling) wood as fuel! 6295
- Abdullah Yusuf Ali
Abu Lahab's wife was a woman of equally passionate spite and cruelty against the sacred person of the holy Prophet. She used to tie bundles of thorns with ropes of twisted palm-leaf fibre and carry them and strew them about on dark nights in the paths which the Prophet was expected to take, in order to cause him bodily injury. "To carry firewood" may also be symbolical for carrying tales between people to embroil them. This was also one of her vices. But she was laying up for herself another kind of Fire and another kind of Rope, the Fire of Punishment, and the Rope of Slavery to Evil. Thus does Evil prepare its own fate. This is the general lesson of sustained craft and cruel wrong-doing recoiling on the wrong-doer's head. See also Introduction to this Sura.
No translation has been selected yet. Please click on the (Compare) link at the top and enable the translations of your choice.
[who bears] around her neck a rope of twisted strands!4
- Mohammad Asad
The term masad signifies anything that consists of twisted strands, irrespective of the material (Qamus, Mughni, Lisan al-'Arab). In the abstract sense in which it is evidently used here, the above phrase seems to have a double connotation: it alludes to the woman's twisted, warped nature, as well as to the spiritual truth that "every human being's destiny is tied to his neck" (see 17:13 and, in particular, the corresponding note [17]) - which, together with verse {2}, reveals the general, timeless purport of this surah.
shall have a rope of palm-leaf fibre around her neck.
- Muhammad Farooq-i-Azam Malik
around her neck will be a rope of palm-fibre.1
- Mustafa Khattab
This was one of the earliest sûrahs revealed of the Quran. Paradoxically, for Abu Lahab to disprove the Quran, all he had to do was accept Islam because this verse condemns him to Hell.
Will have upon her neck a halter of palm fibre.
- Marmaduke Pickthall
A twisted rope of palm-leaf fibre round her (own) neck!
- Abdullah Yusuf Ali
No translation has been selected yet. Please click on the (Compare) link at the top and enable the translations of your choice.
