Makkan, by the majority
The middle years in Makkah
It is Makkan in the saying of Ibn ʿAbbās, al-Ḥasan, ʿIkrimah, Qatādah and the majority; al-Qurṭubī calls it Makkan by agreement. Ibn al-Jawzī notes a report from Ibn ʿAbbās and Qatādah excepting one ayah (36:47), and a saying that the surah is Madinan, which the scholar who relayed it himself called “not well known”. Al-Qurṭubī also mentions that some connected its twelfth ayah with the Banū Salimah of Madinah. The traditional order places it forty-first.
وَفِيها قَوْلانِ أحَدُهُما: أنَّها مَكِّيَّةٌ، قالَهُ ابْنُ عَبّاسٍ، والحَسَنُ، وعِكْرِمَةُ، وقَتادَةُ، والجُمْهُورُسُورَةُ يس وَهِيَ مكية بإجماع. وهى ثلاث وثمانون آيةThe same, in other works
- al-BaghawīMaʿālim al-tanzīlAhl al-Sunnah in creedShāfiʿī in fiqh→
Makkan.
سُورَةُ يس مَكِّيَّةٌ
- al-Suyūṭīal-Durr al-manthūrAshʿarī in creedShāfiʿī in fiqh→
Ibn ʿAbbās: it came down in Makkah. Recorded by Ibn al-Ḍurays, al-Naḥḥās, Ibn Mardawayh and al-Bayhaqī.
أخْرَجَ ابْنُ الضُّرَيْسِ والنَّحّاسُ، وابْنُ مَرْدُويَهْ والبَيْهَقِيُّ في الدَّلائِلِ عَنِ ابْنِ عَبّاسٍ قالَ: نَزَلَتْ سُورَةُ يس بِمَكَّةَ
A report he gathers; its chain is not graded here.
- al-ShawkānīFatḥ al-qadīr→
Makkan.
تَفْسِيرُ سُورَةِ يس وهِيَ مَكِّيَّةٌ
- al-RāzīMafātīḥ al-ghaybAshʿarī in creedShāfiʿī in fiqh→
Makkan.
ثَمانُونَ وثَلاثُ آياتٍ مَكِّيَّةٌ
- Abū al-SuʿūdIrshād al-ʿaql al-salīmMāturīdī in creedḤanafī in fiqh→
Makkan.
سُورَةُ يس مَكِّيَّةٌ، وعَنْهُ ﷺ: ﴿تُدْعى المُعِمَّةَ تَعُمُّ صاحِبَها خَيْرَ الدّارَيْنِ، والدّافِعَةَ والقاضِيَةَ تَدْفَعُ عَنْهُ كُلَّ سُوءٍ وتَقْضِي لَهُ كُلَّ حاجَةٍ﴾ وآياتُها ثَلاثٌ وثَمانُونَ
Each line of English says what the Arabic beneath it says.
What was happening
The surah opens with an oath — by the wise Qurʾan — sworn to a single statement: “You are indeed one of the messengers, on a straight path.” Everything that follows supports it. It was sent to a man who had been called a liar by his own people for years, and to the small company that had believed him.
First comes a story for both. Messengers came to a town: two, then a third to strengthen them. Its people said what Quraysh said — you are only men like us; we see an ill omen in you; stop, or we will stone you. Then a man came running from the farthest part of the city. “My people, follow the messengers. Follow those who ask no wage of you, and are rightly guided.” The surah does not say how he died. It says only that he was told, “Enter the Garden,” and that his first thought was for those who had killed him: “If only my people knew how my Lord has forgiven me.” The Qurʾan names neither him nor the town.
Then the signs, set out for people who think the dead stay dead: the dead earth made to live and yield grain; the night with the day stripped from it; the sun running to a resting-place appointed for it; the moon passing through its stations until it comes back like an old, curved palm-stalk.
The surah ends on a scene the commentators tie to a particular man.◇ One of the chiefs of Quraysh — al-ʿĀṣ ibn Wāʾil, or Ubayy ibn Khalaf — came to the Prophet ﷺ with a decayed bone, crumbled it in his hand, and said: “Muḥammad, will Allah raise this, now that it has rotted?” He said: “Yes. He will cause you to die, then raise you, then enter you into the Fire.” And the closing ayat came down: “He strikes a comparison for Us and forgets his own creation. He says: who will give life to bones when they are dust? Say: He will give them life who produced them the first time.”
- Related, not gradedRelated by the commentators without a graded chain; not established as authentic.
What came down about what
The crumbled bone
Al-ʿĀṣ ibn Wāʾil came to the Messenger of Allah ﷺ with a decayed bone and crumbled it, saying: “Muḥammad, will Allah resurrect this after it has decayed?” He said: “Yes — Allah will resurrect this; He will cause you to die, then bring you to life, then enter you into the fire of Hell.” Then the ayat at the end of Yā-Sīn were revealed.
Ibn ʿAbbās: al-Ḥākim, who graded it ṣaḥīḥ; Ibn Kathīr gives it, and reports from Mujāhid, ʿIkrimah and others naming Ubayy ibn Khalaf.
Graded ṣaḥīḥ
إثبات الرسالة والبعث ودلائلهما.
To establish the truth of the message and of the Resurrection, and the proofs of both.
The surah’s aim, as al-Mukhtaṣar fī al-Tafsīr states it
- The truth of the Messenger ﷺ
- The people of the town
- Signs in the earth and sky
- The Resurrection
- The limbs bearing witness
- “Be”, and it is
Its aims, as Ibn ʿĀshūr sets them out
التحدي بإعجاز القرآن بالحروف المقطعة، وبالقسم بالقرآن تنويها به، وأدمج وصفه بالحكيم إشارة إلى بلوغه أعلى درجات الإحكام. والمقصود من ذلك تحقيق رسالة محمد صلى الله عليه وسلم وتفضيل الدين الذي جاء به في كتاب منزل من الله لإبلاغ الأمة الغاية السامية وهي استقامة أمورها في الدنيا والفوز في الحياة الأبدية، فلذلك وصف الدين بالصراط المستقيم كما تقدم في سورة الفاتحة.
From its first ayah to its last
- 1–1212 ayat · 11% of the surahRead from ayah 1 →
The oath, and who will listen
Yā-Sīn. By the wise Qurʾan: you are indeed one of the messengers, on a straight path — a sending down from the Almighty, the Merciful, to warn a people whose fathers were not warned. Upon most of them the word has come true; it is the same whether you warn them or not. You warn only one who follows the Reminder and fears the Most Merciful unseen. It is We who give life to the dead, and record what they send ahead and the traces they leave.
- 13–3220 ayat · 25% of the surahRead from ayah 13 →
The people of the town
Set forth for them the example of the people of the town, when the messengers came to it: two, whom they denied, so We strengthened them with a third. A man came running from the farthest part of the city: “My people, follow the messengers. Why should I not worship Him who made me?” It was said: “Enter the Garden.” He said: “If only my people knew how my Lord has forgiven me.” After him We sent no host against his people; it was but a single cry, and they were extinguished. Alas for the servants: no messenger comes to them but they mock him.
- 33–4412 ayat · 15% of the surahRead from ayah 33 →
Signs
A sign for them is the dead earth: We give it life and bring grain out of it. A sign for them is the night: We strip the day from it. The sun runs to a resting-place of its own — that is the decree of the Almighty, the Knowing (36:38). The moon We have measured in stations, until it returns like an old date-stalk. It is not for the sun to overtake the moon, nor does the night outrun the day; each floats in an orbit. And a sign for them is that We carried their offspring in the laden ship.
- 45–5410 ayat · 15% of the surahRead from ayah 45 →
The single cry
When they are told, “Spend of what Allah has provided you,” the disbelievers say, “Shall we feed those whom Allah could feed if He willed?” They say, “When is this promise?” They await only a single cry that will seize them as they dispute. The Trumpet is blown, and from the graves they hasten to their Lord: “Woe to us — who has raised us from our sleeping-place?” This is what the Most Merciful promised.
- 55–6814 ayat · 14% of the surahRead from ayah 55 →
The two companies
The people of the Garden that Day are happily occupied — they and their spouses, in shade, on couches. “Peace”: a word from a Merciful Lord. “And stand apart today, you guilty. Did I not charge you, children of Ādam, not to worship Satan?” Today We seal their mouths; their hands speak to Us, and their feet bear witness to what they used to earn.
- 69–768 ayat · 9% of the surahRead from ayah 69 →
Not poetry
We have not taught him poetry, nor would it befit him: it is only a reminder and a clear Qurʾan, to warn whoever is alive. Do they not see the livestock We made for them, which they own, ride and eat? Yet they have taken gods besides Allah. So let their words not grieve you.
- 77–837 ayat · 10% of the surahRead from ayah 77 →
Who will give life to bones?
Does man not see that We created him from a drop — and there he is, an open adversary? He says, “Who will give life to bones when they have crumbled?” Say: He who produced them the first time. Is not He who created the heavens and the earth able to create the like of them? His command, when He intends a thing, is only to say to it, “Be,” and it is. So glory to Him in whose hand is the dominion of all things; and to Him you will be returned.
The division into passages is a reading aid, written for this page; it is not part of the muṣḥaf. Each passage is drawn as long as its words are.
The sound each ayah closes on
Read aloud, every ayah closes on a sound — its fāṣilah — and the closes answer one another for a stretch, then turn. Each sound this surah closes on is a line of the staff below, and the surah is the gold line stepping along them, an ayah at a time: where it steps to another line, the rhyme turns. The dotted lines are where its passages begin.
All 83 of its ayat close on one sound.
Move along the staff to see what each ayah closes on.
Computed from the text, each ayah as it is said when the reciter stops on it: the last vowel falls away, tanwīn on alif is said as a long ā, and tāʾ marbūṭah as h. Closes the ear hears as one rhyme share a line — -ūn, -īn and -īm; -ān and -ām — and an ayah that is only the opening letters closes on the name of its last letter.
From the Prophet ﷺ and his Companions
Abū Dharr said: I was with the Prophet ﷺ in the mosque at sunset, and he said: “Abū Dharr, do you know where the sun sets?” I said: “Allah and His Messenger know best.” He said: “It goes until it prostrates beneath the Throne. That is His saying: ‘And the sun runs to a resting-place of its own; that is the decree of the Almighty, the Knowing.’”The name it is known by
The two letters it opens with. Like the other letters at the heads of surahs, their meaning is known to Allah; Ibn al-Jawzī lists five sayings of the early commentators about these two, the best known being that of Ibn ʿAbbās and others — “O man”.
Its place in the muṣḥaf
Ayat you will hear named
Where this comes from
The figures at the head of the page are counted from the text. The Arabic quotations are taken letter for letter from the copies of the classical works held on this site, and each links to the passage it stands in. The rest was written for Mishkāt from the works below. It is an introduction, not a tafsir: where it matters, read the scholars themselves.
Works quoted on this page
- تفسير الطبريJāmiʿ al-bayānMuḥammad ibn Jarīr al-Ṭabarī (d. 310 AH)
- تفسير البغويMaʿālim al-tanzīlal-Ḥusayn al-Baghawī (d. 516 AH)
- تفسير ابن الجوزيZād al-masīrAbū al-Faraj ibn al-Jawzī (d. 597 AH)
- تفسير القرطبيal-Jāmiʿ li-aḥkām al-QurʾānShams al-Dīn al-Qurṭubī (d. 671 AH)
- تفسير ابن كثيرTafsīr al-Qurʾān al-ʿaẓīmIsmāʿīl ibn Kathīr (d. 774 AH)
- الدر المنثورal-Durr al-manthūrJalāl al-Dīn al-Suyūṭī (d. 911 AH)
- فتح القدير للشوكانيFatḥ al-qadīrMuḥammad al-Shawkānī (d. 1250 AH)
- تفسير الرازيMafātīḥ al-ghaybFakhr al-Dīn al-Rāzī (d. 606 AH)
- تفسير أبي السعودIrshād al-ʿaql al-salīmAbū al-Suʿūd al-ʿImādī (d. 982 AH)
- التحرير والتنويرal-Taḥrīr wa-l-tanwīrMuḥammad al-Ṭāhir ibn ʿĀshūr (d. 1393 AH)
- المختصر في التفسيرal-Mukhtaṣar fī al-tafsīrMarkaz Tafsīr, a committee of scholars
Beside each scholar quoted stand his creed and his school of fiqh, so that he can be read with discernment. The site’s library holds other commentaries as well; the introductions do not draw on them.
al-Qurṭubī is quoted on these pages only for what he transmits: who said a surah is Makkan or Madinan, and what it has been called. On the attributes of Allah his commentary interprets, in places, in the way of the Ashʿarīs rather than the way of the Salaf, and nothing of that is taken from him here.
al-Rāzī and Abū al-Suʿūd are quoted on these pages only for where a surah came down, and Ibn ʿĀshūr only for the aims of the surah. Nothing on the attributes of Allah is taken from them, and no report comes by way of them. Ibn ʿĀshūr’s statement of the aims is not in the site’s copy of his book: it is read from the Shamela typing as OpenITI holds it, with reports and al-Zamakhsharī’s words left out, and it links to its page there.
Every hadith here says where it is recorded and how it is graded. What is in al-Bukhārī or Muslim is marked ṣaḥīḥ. Outside the two, the grading followed is al-Albānī’s; where none of his was found, the scholar who graded it is named. A report known to be weak or fabricated is not given here at all. A report that is ḥasan, or a Companion’s own saying, or related by the commentators without a graded chain, says so beside it. In the account of what was happening, a small sign after a sentence says the same of the report that sentence tells, and a question mark stands where a date or a figure is not certain, or beside a grading — underlined — that has something to say about its own source: rest on it, or touch it, and it gives the reason. What is drawn from the sīrah — the campaigns, the dates, who was present — is history as its scholars transmit it, and is not graded here.
Also drawn on
- Ṣaḥīḥ al-Bukhārī and Ṣaḥīḥ Muslim
The order of revelation is the one printed at the head of each surah in the Egyptian muṣḥaf, which rests on lists transmitted from Ibn ʿAbbās and Jābir ibn Zayd. It places a surah by where it began. Many surahs came down in parts, over years, and the scholars treat the list as a guide, not a certainty.