Surah 110 of 114 · Madinah
سُورَةُ النَّصۡرِ
An-Nasr Divine Support
3 verses · revealed in Madinah
The context
An-Nasr is Madinan and stands among the very last of the Quran: Ibn Abbas related that it was the final surah revealed as a whole. Its horizon is the conquest of Makkah in the eighth year after hijrah, the emigration, and the year of delegations that followed, when tribe after tribe crossed Arabia to enter Allah’s religion in waves, afwaja, the crowds the surah names. Twenty years of refusal dissolved into processions of acceptance, and heaven marked the moment with three verses.
The Companions heard more in it than triumph. In Bukhari, Umar seated the young Ibn Abbas among the elders of Badr and asked them about this surah; they spoke of victory and praise, but Ibn Abbas said: it is the appointed end of the Messenger of Allah ﷺ, announced to him: when the work is complete, the worker is called home, so glorify and seek forgiveness. Umar agreed. And Aishah saw the surah enter his ﷺ very posture: after it came down he constantly said in his bowing and prostration, Glory to You, O Allah, our Lord, and praise; O Allah, forgive me.
The name
The surah is named for an-nasr, the decisive help of Allah in its first verse. Some early scholars called it Surat at-Tawdi, the Farewell, because beneath its victory they heard the gentle announcement of the Prophet’s ﷺ approaching departure, and both names are true to it at once.
How it moves
- 1-2Help, conquest, crowdsWhen Allah’s help and the opening of Makkah come, and you see people entering His religion in waves: the whole harvest of the mission gathered into two verses.
- 3-3Praise and pardon at the summitThe commanded response to total victory: glorify your Lord with praise and seek His forgiveness, for He is ever accepting of return.
The themes
Victory belongs to Allah
Nasru Allah, the help is His and the conquest is His opening: the surah files twenty years of sacrifice under one Owner, and pride finds no foothold.
Endings announced gently
The Companions who understood deepest heard farewell inside triumph: completion of the work is the signal that the worker will be called home.
Istighfar crowns achievement
At the summit, the command is to seek forgiveness, sealing every accomplishment against self-congratulation and repairing whatever the long road bruised.
He is ever-returning
Innahu kana tawwaba: the surah’s last name of Allah promises that every turner toward Him is received, the door open at the end as at the beginning.
The heart of it
An-Nasr read slowly reshapes how a person stands at his own summits. The world teaches victory laps; this surah teaches that the correct posture at the peak is bowed, tasbih, glorifying, hamd, praising, istighfar, asking pardon, because achievement is His gift passing through your hands, and because no long labor is finished without stains that need washing. Whoever completes anything, a degree, a business, a book of the Quran, a lifetime of raising children, is handed this surah as the manner of finishing.
And beneath that, the tender reading of Ibn Abbas waits for every reciter who is growing older: completed work is a summons. The surah lets you hear your own endings approaching not as loss but as the call that came to the most beloved of creation ﷺ, and it fills the remaining time with the three verbs that make any ending safe: glorify, praise, seek forgiveness. He is ever-returning to the one who returns.
Verses worth knowing
On reciting it
After this surah came down, Aishah relates, the Prophet ﷺ filled his bowing and prostration with, Glory to You, O Allah, our Lord, and praise; O Allah, forgive me, interpreting the Quran in his own limbs, so the surah carries a sound portrait of how he ﷺ received it.
Sunnah-confirmedBukhari 794, Muslim 484
Read beside it
On the shelf
Surahs it travels with