ABRAHAM
IBRAHIM

Heb: . His name means "father of a multitude" or "chief of multitude"

In Islam, Abraham is also called the Friend of God, Khalilu 'llah and his name, Ibrahim, occurs 69 times in the Qur'an, making him the second most-occuring name of prophets in the Qur'an after Moses. He was supposed to be one of the six prophets in Islam to whom God delivered special laws. He was said to be given twenty portions (suhifah) of scripture.

The father of Abraham in the Qur'an is Azar, in contrast to Terah in the Bible (Genesis 11:25-26) and the Midrash. In fact, ibn Hisham gave the name as Tarih, sufficiently close to the Bible's. Thus, this name is known to Muslims. It is a curious question on what basis and for what reasons is his name called Azar in the Qur'an? It is not clear if there is any etymological connection between these two names. However, according to Tisdall on the authority of the historian Eusebius, the Syrian name had a similar sound to Azar. Perhaps, that is how Muhammad came to know of this name during one of his merchantile expeditions to Syria.

Abraham's original name was Abram () meaning "exalted father". God later changed his name to Abraham at the age of 99 (Genesis 17:5). However, the Qur'an calls "Abraham" a youth. See the article "Abraham's name" for a discussion of this problem.

Some background and insights in the importance and use of Abraham in the Qur'an can be found in the article, The Significance of Abraham.


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