Prophets in Islam () are individuals in Islam who are believed to spread God's message on Earth and serve as models of ideal human behaviour. Some prophets are categorized as messengers (. Sing. , ), those who transmit divine revelation, most of them through the interaction of an angel. Muslims believe that many prophets existed, including many not mentioned in the Quran. The Quran states: "And for every community there is a messenger." Belief in the Islamic prophets is one of the six articles of the Islamic faith.
Muslims believe that the first prophet was also the first human being Adam, created by God. Many of the revelations delivered by the 48 prophets in Judaism and many prophets of Christianity are mentioned as such in the Quran with the Arabic versions of their names; for example, the Jewish Elisha is called Alyasaʿ, Job is Ayyub, Jesus is 'Isa, etc. The Torah given to Moses (Musa) is called Tawrat, the Psalms given to David (Dawud) is the Zabur, the Gospel given to Jesus is Injil.
The last prophet in Islam is Muhammad, whom Muslims believe to be the Seal of the Prophets, to whom the Quran was revealed in a series of revelations (and written down by his companions). Muslims believe the Quran is the divine word of God, thus immutable and protected from distortion and corruption,Understanding the Qurán - Page xii, Ahmad Hussein Sakr - 2000 destined to remain in its true form until the Last Day. Although Muhammad is considered the last prophet, some Muslim traditions also recognize and venerate saints.Radtke, B., Lory, P., Zarcone, Th., DeWeese, D., Gaborieau, M., F. M. Denny, Françoise Aubin, J. O. Hunwick and N. Mchugh, "Walī", in: Encyclopaedia of Islam, Second Edition, Edited by: P. Bearman, Th. Bianquis, C. E. Bosworth, E. van Donzel, W. P. Heinrichs. In Islam, every prophet preached the same core beliefs: the Oneness of God, worshipping of that one God, avoidance of idolatry and sin, and the belief in the Day of Resurrection or the Day of Judgement and life after death. Prophets and messengers are believed to have been sent by God to different communities during different times in history.
Terminology
Pre-Quranic
The Syriac form of rasūl Allāh (), s̲h̲eliḥeh d-allāhā, occurs frequently in the apocryphal Acts of St. Thomas. The corresponding verb for s̲h̲eliḥeh—s̲h̲alaḥ, occurs in connection with the prophets in the Hebrew Bible.A. J. Wensinck, "Rasul", Encyclopaedia of Islam
Terminology in the Quran In Arabic, the term nabī (Arabic plural form: , ) means "prophet". Forms of this noun occur 75 times in the Quran. The term nubuwwah ( "prophethood") occurs five times in the Quran. The terms rasūl (Arabic plural: , ) and mursal (Arabic: , , pl: , ) denote "messenger with law given by/received from God" and occur more than 300 times. The term for a prophetic "message" (Arabic: , , pl: , ) appears in the Quran in ten instances.Uri Rubin, "Prophets and Prophethood", Encyclopedia of the Qur'an
The following table shows these words in different languages:Strong's Concordance
+Prophet and Messenger in the Bible and Quran Arabic English Greek Hebrew , prophet () , , messengerprophetapostle , , , , }}
Usage of Angels
Exegetes usually distinguish the messenger angels (rasūl), who carry out divine decrees between heaven and earth, from the angels in heaven ().Wensinck, A. J. (2013). The Muslim Creed: Its Genesis and Historical Development. Vereinigtes Königreich: Taylor & Francis. p. 200Imam Abu Hanifa’s Al Fiqh Al Akbar Explained By أبو حنيفة النعمان بن ثابت Abu ’l Muntaha Ahmad Al Maghnisawi Abdur Rahman Ibn Yusuf" In the Quran and tafsir, the term rasūl is also used for messengers from among the angels. The term is used in , , and , and is also used for the servants of the Angel of Death.Mehdi Azaiez, Gabriel Said Reynolds, Tommaso Tesei, Hamza M. Zafer The Qur'an Seminar Commentary / Le Qur'an Seminar: A Collaborative Study of 50 Qur'anic Passages / Commentaire collaboratif de 50 passages coraniques Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co KG, 07.11.2016
Characteristics In Islam, the Quran is believed to be a revelation from the last prophet in the Abrahamic succession, Muhammad, and its contents detail what Muslims refer to as the straight path. According to Islamic belief, every prophet preached submission and obedience to God (Islam). There is an emphasis on charity, prayer, pilgrimage, fasting, with the most emphasis given to the strict belief and worship of a singular God.Wheeler, Historical Dictionary of Prophets in Islam and Judaism, "Prophets" The Quran itself calls Islam the "religion of Abraham" (Ibrahim) and refers to Jacob (Yaqub) and the Twelve Tribes of Israel as being Muslims.
The Quran says: Prophets in Islam are exemplars to ordinary humans. They exhibit model characteristics of righteousness and moral conduct. Prophetic typologies shared by all prophets include prophetic lineage, advocating monotheism, transmitting God's messages, and warning of the eschatological consequences of rejecting God. Prophetic revelation often comes in the form of signs and divine proofs. Each prophet is connected to one another, and ultimately supports the final prophetic message of Muhammad. The qualities prophets possess are meant to lead people towards the straight path. In one hadith, it was stated: "Among men the prophets suffer most."
Signs and divine proofs
Throughout the Quran, prophets such as Moses and Jesus often perform miracles or are associated with miraculous events. The Quran makes clear that these events always occur through God and not of the prophet's own volition. Throughout the Meccan passages there are instances where the Meccan people demand visual proofs of Muhammad's divine connection to God to which Muhammad replies "The signs are only with Allah, and I am only a plain warner." (Q29:50) According to Muslims, this instance makes clear that prophets are only mortals who can testify to God's omnipotence and produce signs when he wills it. Furthermore, the Quran states that visual and verbal proofs are often rejected by the unbelievers as being sihr ("magic") The Quran reads: "They claim that he tries to bewitch them and make them believe that he speaks the word of God, although he is just an ordinary human being like themselves. (Q74:24-25)
Sin and protection In the early years of Islam, prophets were not considered infallible or sinless.Schöck, C. (2021). Adam im Islam (Vol. 168). Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co KG. p. 90 (German) Every greater prophet, with exception to Jesus, was accused of sin. Not only was it possible for prophets to sin, their sins had soteriological significance.Abu l-Lait as-Samarqandi's Commentary on Abu Hanifa al-Fiqh al-absat Introduction, Text and Commentary by Hans Daiber Islamic concept of Belief in the 4th/10th Century Institute for the Study of Languages and Cultures of Asia and Africa p. 243-245 For example, Moses in Islam needs forgiveness after he killed an innocent person.Schöck, C. (2021). Adam im Islam (Vol. 168). Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co KG. p. 141 (German) Adam regretted his sin in Garden Eden, which is supposed to teach humans how to repent.Stieglecker, H. (1962). Die Glaubenslehren des Islam. Deutschland: F. Schöningh. p. 194 (German)
By the ninth century CE, Sunni Islam began to consider prophets to be sinless. It became a major concern to ensure the reliability of the revelation. This doctrine probably developed under influence of Shia Islam from the doctrine of the infallible Shia Imams (ʿiṣmah).Schimmel, And Muhammad is His Messenger, 56-60. Later Mutazilites agree to this view and hold that prophets are protected from both minor sins and major sins.Schimmel, And Muhammad is His Messenger, 60. From among the Asharites it has been argued that prophets are protected from sinning in their function as a messenger. Al-Baqillani stated that prophets are mainly protected from deception and lying when they convey God's message and from major sins, but are not generally sinless. The majority of theologians subscribed to this opinion.
Later, especially Muhammad is described as infallible among Sufis. When asked how Muhammad was not affected by the touch of the devil, Rumi compares devils to a dog's saliva poured into an ocean, the ocean symbolizing Muhammad's greatness. Other people, on the other hand, are like a cup filled with water. The dog cannot affect the ocean, but the dog's saliva affects the cup of water.Schimmel, And Muhammad is His Messenger, 61.
Wisdom Muhammad was given a divine gift of revelation through the angel Gabriel. This direct communication with the divine underlines the human experience but the message of the Quran dignifies this history of revelation with these select people in human history the foundation for Muhammed's prophetic lineage.
The Quran mentions various divinely-bestowed gifts given to various prophets. These may be interpreted as books or forms of celestial knowledge. Although all prophets are believed by Muslims to have been immensely gifted, special mention of "wisdom" or "knowledge" for a particular prophet is understood to mean that some secret knowledge was revealed to him. The Quran mentions that Abraham prayed for wisdom and later received it. It also mentions that Joseph and Moses both attained wisdom when they reached full age; David received wisdom with kingship, after slaying Goliath; Lot (Lut) received wisdom whilst prophesying in Sodom and Gomorrah; John the Baptist received wisdom while still a mere youth; and Jesus received wisdom and was vouchsafed the Gospel.
Prophetic lineage
Abraham is widely recognized for being the father of monotheism in the Abrahamic religions. In the Quran, he is recognized as a messenger, a spiritual examplar to mankind, and a link in the chain of Muslim prophets. Muhammad, God's final messenger and the revelator of the Quran, is a descendant of Abraham, and Muhammad completes Abraham's prophetic lineage. This relationship can be seen in the Quranic chapter 6:
The Quran presents the world as full of interlocking dramas and conflicts. The divine drama concerns the events of creation and banishment from the garden; while the human drama concerns the life and history of humanity but, also includes the events in the life of the prophets. Islamic morality is founded on this virtuous living through faith in the life ordained by the divine. This is the divine task given to believers accompanied by the divine gift that the Prophets had in revelation and perspective of ayat. The prophets are called to follow and reclaim the message of the straight path. This is the key feature of the authority of their revelation, which fits within the Abrahamic tradition. The Quran's place within the broader Abrahamic context gives the revelation to Muhammed the same authority as the Tawrat and the Injil.
Representation and prophetic connection to Muhammad