Al-Ikhlas, surah 112, is four short verses, fifteen words in Arabic. Most Muslim children learn it after Al-Fatihah, and it is recited in countless prayers every day. Yet the Prophet ﷺ said something about it that surprised his Companions.
Four verses
Who He is, and what He is not.
قُلۡ هُوَ ٱللَّهُ أَحَدٌ
Say, "He is Allah, [who is] One
Al-Ikhlāṣ 112:1
ٱللَّهُ ٱلصَّمَدُ
Allah, the Eternal Refuge
Al-Ikhlāṣ 112:2
لَمۡ يَلِدۡ وَلَمۡ يُولَدۡ
He neither begets nor is born
Al-Ikhlāṣ 112:3
وَلَمۡ يَكُن لَّهُۥ كُفُوًا أَحَدُۢ
Nor is there to Him any equivalent
Al-Ikhlāṣ 112:4
Equal to a third
“It is equal to a third of the Qur’an.”
A man heard another man reciting Qul huwa llāhu aḥad over and over. The next morning he told the Prophet ﷺ about it, as if he thought it was not much. The Prophet ﷺ answered:
وَالَّذِي نَفْسِي بِيَدِهِ إِنَّهَا لَتَعْدِلُ ثُلُثَ الْقُرْآنِ
“By Him in Whose Hand my life is, this surah is equal to one third of the Qur’an!”
In another report (Sahih al-Bukhari 5015) he asked his Companions whether any of them could recite a third of the Qur’an in one night. They found that too much, and he replied: Allah, the One, the Eternal Refuge, is a third of the Qur’an.
Why a third? A common explanation among scholars is that the Qur’an’s content falls into three parts: who God is, accounts of the prophets and peoples, and commands and prohibitions. Al-Ikhlas is entirely about the first, and says all of it. Scholars also point out that this concerns its worth, not that it replaces reading the whole Qur’an.
One, at the start and the end
The surah opens with the word “one” and ends with it.
The first verse ends with aḥad, one. The last verse ends with aḥad too: nor is there to Him any (aḥad) equivalent. The same word frames the surah. The first time it describes Allah: He is One. The second time it denies everyone else: no one is like Him.
And the word in the second verse, aṣ-Ṣamad, appears nowhere else in the entire Qur’an. It describes the One to whom all turn and whom all need, while He needs nothing. One word, used once, in the surah that is wholly about who God is.
What He is not
Three denials: He does not beget, is not born, has no equal.
The first half of the surah says who Allah is; the second half says what He is not. He has neither parent nor child, and nothing in creation is comparable to Him. The surah’s name, al-Ikhlāṣ, means “purification” or “sincerity”: purifying belief in God of everything that does not befit Him.
“Tell him that Allah loves him”
A man who recited it in every prayer, out of love.
The Prophet ﷺ once sent out a group under the command of a man who led them in prayer, and he always ended his recitation with Al-Ikhlas. When they returned they told the Prophet ﷺ, and he said: Ask him why he does so.
سَلُوهُ لأَىِّ شَىْءٍ يَصْنَعُ ذَلِكَ. فَسَأَلُوهُ فَقَالَ لأَنَّهَا صِفَةُ الرَّحْمَنِ، وَأَنَا أُحِبُّ أَنْ أَقْرَأَ بِهَا. فَقَالَ النَّبِيُّ صلى الله عليه وسلم أَخْبِرُوهُ أَنَّ اللَّهَ يُحِبُّهُ
“He said: Because it describes the Most Merciful, and I love to recite it. The Prophet ﷺ said: Tell him that Allah loves him.”
Every night
Every night, when the Prophet ﷺ went to bed, he recited Al-Ikhlas and the last two surahs of the Qur’an, Al-Falaq and An-Nas, blew into his cupped hands and passed them over his body, three times (Sahih al-Bukhari 5017). The last three surahs of the Book: the first says who God is, the other two seek refuge in Him.