Yunus

The story

Yunus preached to Nineveh, a city of a hundred thousand or more (37:147), and when they refused, he left angry before permission came, 'and thought We would not decree upon him' (21:87). The sea he fled across became his summons: the storm, the lots drawn three times against him, and the swallow of the great fish. In the stomach of a whale, under the storm, under the night, he found the lowest room in the world and made it a mosque.

From the three darknesses rose the du'a that the Prophet ﷺ said no distressed Muslim ever prays without answer: 'La ilaha illa anta, subhanaka, inni kuntu min az-zalimin. There is no deity except You; exalted are You; indeed I have been of the wrongdoers' (21:87). Tawhid, glorification, ownership of fault: three sentences, three keys. 'So We responded to him and saved him from the distress. And thus do We save the believers' (21:88), a promise generalized to everyone who prays it.

Cast ashore sick, shaded by a gourd vine Allah grew over him, he was returned to his people, and then came the miracle unique in the Qur'an: Nineveh believed, entire, the only city of a warned people whose faith arrived in time and lifted the punishment (10:98). The prophet who left too early returned to the largest success in the Book, taught forever that timing belongs to Allah.

The Qur'an on it

The narrations

In numbers

• Named in the Qur'an4 times · also Dhun-Nun and the companion of the fish
• His city100,000 or more, and they believed (37:147)
• A whole surah bears his nameSurah 10 · Yunus

The journey

1. Nineveh refuses
2. The early departure
3. Lots on the ship
4. Three darknesses
5. The du'a
6. Cast ashore
7. The city that believed

Read beside it

The words

• التَّوْحِيدTawhidBelief
• القُرْآنQur'anThe Qur'an
• الدُّعَاءDu'aThe heart

People beside it

• AlyasaOf the excellent onesاليسع
• The Whale of YunusThe appointed whaleالحوت يونس

A story

• Saburone of the eight stories of the Names
• Razzaqone of the eight stories of the Names