Ali 'Imran · Madani · ayah 84 of 200

Ali 'Imran 3:84

قُلْ ءَامَنَّا بِٱللَّهِ وَمَآ أُنزِلَ عَلَيْنَا وَمَآ أُنزِلَ عَلَىٰٓ إِبْرَٰهِيمَ وَإِسْمَـٰعِيلَ وَإِسْحَـٰقَ وَيَعْقُوبَ وَٱلْأَسْبَاطِ وَمَآ أُوتِىَ مُوسَىٰ وَعِيسَىٰ وَٱلنَّبِيُّونَ مِن رَّبِّهِمْ لَا نُفَرِّقُ بَيْنَ أَحَدٍ مِّنْهُمْ وَنَحْنُ لَهُۥ مُسْلِمُونَ

“Say, "We have believed in Allāh and in what was revealed to us and what was revealed to Abraham, Ishmael, Isaac, Jacob, and the Descendants [al-Asbāṭ], and in what was given to Moses and Jesus and to the prophets from their Lord. We make no distinction between any of them, and we are Muslims [submitting] to Him."”

Saheeh International

Essence

Say: we believe in Allah and in everything He revealed to every prophet, rejecting none of them, and to Him we submit.

A reflection

The covenant answered from the other side

Three ayat earlier, Allah took a covenant from every prophet. If a messenger came after them, confirming what they had, they must believe in him and support him. Now the Prophet ﷺ is told what to say, and it answers that covenant from the other side.

'Say: we believe in Allah, and what was revealed to us, and what was revealed to Ibrāhīm, Ismāʿīl, Isḥāq, Yaʿqūb and the tribes. And what was given to Mūsā and ʿĪsā and the prophets from their Lord.'

A classical commentator notices the symmetry. The earlier prophets pledged to believe in the one who would come after them. Here the last messenger affirms every one who came before him. And he is asked to pledge to no one after him. The same commentator reads that silence as a sign that no prophet would follow.

The word asbāṭ, the tribes, has a picture of its own. One lexicon describes branches running out from a single trunk. Grandchildren were asbāṭ, the family line reaching on and on.

So the ayah draws one great tree. Ibrāhīm is near its root. The branches run through Isḥāq and Yaʿqūb and the tribes, through Mūsā and ʿĪsā, and through Ismāʿīl to Muhammad ﷺ. The Muslim does not stand on one branch looking across at rivals. He stands in the tree and honours all of it.

That is a remarkable identity to inherit. To be Muslim is to claim every prophet as your own, and to answer the covenant they all made.

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.