Maryam · Makki · ayah 6 of 98

Maryam 19:6

يَرِثُنِى وَيَرِثُ مِنْ ءَالِ يَعْقُوبَ ۖ وَٱجْعَلْهُ رَبِّ رَضِيًّا

“Who will inherit me[809] and inherit from the family of Jacob. And make him, my Lord, pleasing [to You]."”

Saheeh International

Essence

Zakariya asked for an heir to what no will can pass on, and ended by asking that the child be pleasing to his Lord.

A reflection

An inheritance no will can pass on

We think of an inheritance as something that passes automatically. A will is read, a house changes hands, a bank account moves from one name to another. The heir does nothing except be there.

Zakariya asks for an heir who will inherit from him and from the family of Yaʿqūb. The commentaries say what he meant. Knowledge, says one early authority. His prophethood and his knowledge, says another. The plainest commentaries agree: knowledge and prophethood, from his own line and from the line of Yaʿqūb, his forefather.

That kind of inheritance cannot pass automatically. One classical commentator raises the objection himself. Knowledge, good conduct and prophethood are not inherited at all, he notes. They come by being given, or by being earned. So in what sense can a son inherit them?

His answer is that inheriting means standing where the one before you stood. A son is said to inherit wealth when he takes his father's place in using it. In the same way, a son who becomes a prophet after his father can be said to inherit him. He takes up the work of the faith where his father left it.

So the heir Zakariya asks for is not a recipient. He is a continuer. He will have to stand in the same place and carry the same load.

That changes what the word asks of anyone who hopes to be an heir of the righteous. You do not receive their faith the way you receive their furniture. You take up where they stood, or you inherit nothing.

Every family that prays has some inheritance like this waiting. It will not arrive by itself in anyone's name.

The full entry has 5 more reflections, questions to sit with, and "Live it today" - with the words, the roots and the tafsir alongside. Free, no account, works offline.