Ash-Shu'ara · Makki · ayah 86 of 227

Ash-Shu'ara 26:86

وَٱغْفِرْ لِأَبِىٓ إِنَّهُۥ كَانَ مِنَ ٱلضَّآلِّينَ

“And forgive my father. Indeed, he has been of those astray.”

Saheeh International

Essence

Ibrahim turns from his own needs to the father who threatened him, calls him 'my father', names his straying honestly and asks forgiveness.

A reflection

He still said 'my father'

Ibrahim has just finished asking for himself. Wisdom, the company of the righteous, an honest name among later generations, a place among the heirs of the Garden. Then he names his father.

One classical commentator notices the order. Having asked the good of both worlds for himself, Ibrahim asks it next for the person most closely joined to him.

Remember who this is. Elsewhere the Quran records this father's answer to his son's gentle preaching: stop, or I will stone you (19:46). In this surah Ibrahim has just stood before his people and called their idols an enemy to him (26:77). His father stood among those people.

And still the word is abī. My father. Not 'that man', not a name held at arm's length. The tie is spoken aloud, in the middle of a prayer, before the Lord of the worlds.

A man fills in a hospital admission form for his father, who has not spoken to him in six years. The nurse asks for next of kin. He writes his own name and, under relationship, 'son'. He does not hesitate, because there is nothing to decide. The silence was his father's choice. The word was never his to withdraw.

That is what this ayah models. Disagreement, even about the deepest thing, does not dissolve kinship. Ibrahim separated completely from his father's worship. He still carried him in the first breath of his prayer for others.

If someone close to you has turned away from what you hold, notice what you call them in your own heart. The prayer for them begins there. A name said with love is already half a supplication.

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.