Yūsuf

بِسْمِ اللَّهِ الرَّحْمَنِ الرَّحِيمِ

الر تِلْكَ ءَايَاتُ الْكِتَابِ الْمُبِينِ

In The Name of Allah, The Beneficent, The Merciful

1. “Alif ‘A’, Lam ‘L’, Ra ‘R’. These are the verses of the Book (which makes the truth) Manifest.”

A General Note

Everything is dependent upon Allah, and every person lives with Him. Every type of evolution and progress is initiated in His name and will be realized by executing the programs He has ordained by means of prophets, the personal development of prophets has been fulfilled in the Name of Allah, for had there not been any trust put in Him, the prophets could not have overcome the difficulties of the life which had confronted them. This Surah also begins with the abbreviated letters of alif, lam, and ra’ which exhibit the magnificence of the Qur’an and the synthesizing of profound and meaningful verses out of simple letters of the Arabic alphabet.

Perhaps, it is for this reason that after mentioning the abbreviated letters, Allah (s.w.t.) immediately refers to the magnificence of the Qur’an by saying:

“…These are the verses of the Book (which makes the truth) manifest.”

Incidentally, concerning the magnitude of the holy phrase /bismillah-ir-rahman-ir-rahim/ and the abbreviated letters with which the suras begin, please refer to the beginning of the suras Al-Hamd, and Al-Baqarah, and to the detailed narrations discussed under them.