4. Al-Quddus

First PublishedSep 17, 2026Last UpdatedSep 30, 2026ByCallUponHim.com

القُدُّوس

Al-Quddūs — The Most Holy. The Absolutely Pure. The One Free from All Imperfection.

1. In One Line

Allah is utterly free from every defect, need, limitation, partner, and resemblance to creation — pure not partially or relatively, but absolutely and in every conceivable respect at once.

2. At a Glance

Topic	Summary
Status	Stated in the Qur’an (59:23, 62:1); may be said on its own
Occurrences	2 (Al-Hashr 59:23, Al-Jumu’ah 62:1)
Prophetic use	Glorification only: in rukū’ and sujūd, and after witr
Key pattern / pairing	Always follows Al-Malik, in the Qur’an and in the witr dhikr
Root and form	Q-D-S (purity, freedom from blemish); intensive fu”ūl, so exclusionary — it removes imperfection rather than adding a quality
Differs from	As-Salam negates defects; Al-Quddus negates everything the mind can conceive
Scholars’ grouping	Majesty (Jalāl); Name of the Essence
Effect on the heart	Haybah (primary), iftiqār (secondary); hope and love notably absent
Living the Name	Embody: purify knowledge and will; do not claim purity (53:32)
Counterweight	At-Tawwab or Al-Ghafur

3. Status of the Name

Source

Stated in the Qur’an. The Name appears as a noun applied to Allah twice (59:23, 62:1). It is also used as a Name in authentic hadith (see section 5). See Status of the Name for how sources are ranked.

Rules of Use

• Said alone or in pairs: May be said on its own. It is not one of the Names that may be said only with a counterpart, even though the Qur’an always places it after Al-Malik.
• As a personal name: ʿAbd al-Quddūs, “servant of the Most Holy,” is a sound name, following the pattern of ʿAbd joined to a Name of Allah.
• Describing a human: The bare Name is not given to a person. Jurists count al-Quddūs among the Names that belong to Allah alone and may not be used as a human name (IslamQA 1692). Other words from the root do describe created things — the Holy Land, the holy valley, and Jibrīl as Rūḥ al-Qudus (see section 7) — but the intensive Name itself is reserved for Allah.

Where scholars differ: no disagreement on the Name’s status was found.

4. Where It Appears in the Qur’an

The name appears exactly twice — and both times immediately after Al-Malik (The Sovereign).

Surah Al-Hashr (59:23)

Passage type: Glorification; also Correcting false claims.

“He is Allah, other than whom there is no deity, the Sovereign (Al-Malik), the Pure (Al-Quddus), the Perfection (As-Salam), the Bestower of Faith (Al-Mu’min), the Overseer (Al-Muhaymin), the Exalted in Might (Al-Aziz), the Compeller (Al-Jabbar), the Superior (Al-Mutakabbir). Exalted is Allah above whatever they associate with Him.”

— 59:23

Surah Al-Jumu’ah (62:1)

Passage type: Glorification.

“Whatever is in the heavens and whatever is on the earth is exalting Allah, the Sovereign (Al-Malik), the Pure (Al-Quddus), the Exalted in Might (Al-Aziz), the Wise (Al-Hakim).”

— 62:1

5. How the Prophet ﷺ Used It

The name never appears in a request. Its prophetic usage is consistently tasbīḥ (glorification), never petition. In worship it is used mainly in glorification.

In Ruku’ and Sujud

Subbūhun Quddūsun, Rabbul-malā’ikati war-Rūḥ “Glorified and Most Holy, Lord of the angels and the Spirit.”

Sources: Sahih Muslim 487 · Riyad as-Salihin 1426 · Sunan an-Nasa’i 1134 · Musnad Ahmad 26070–71 Chain: Qatādah → Mutarrif ibn ‘Abdullāh → ‘Ā’ishah (RA) — graded Sahih

Three things worth noting:

1. Double intensification. Subbūḥ and Quddūs share the identical fu”ūl pattern. Not redundancy — Subbūḥ points to Allah being maximally glorified by others; Quddūs points to Allah maximally being pure in Himself, regardless of who glorifies Him.
2. Posture vs. content. The body is at its lowest (prostration) while the words are at their highest (absolute transcendence). Scholars read this contrast as deliberate.
3. “Rabbul-malā’ikati war-Rūḥ.” “Rūḥ” here is Jibrīl — whose own title, Rūḥ al-Qudus, shares this root. His holiness is derivative; Allah’s is intrinsic.

At the End of Witr

Subḥānal-Malikil-Quddūs — recited three times, voice raised on the third.

Sources: Sunan an-Nasa’i 1699, 1729, 1733, 1740, 1741 Chain: Ubayy ibn Ka’b (RA), via ‘Abdur-Raḥmān ibn Abzā — graded Sahih (Darussalam, on sunnah.com)

6. Patterns and Pairings

Patterns

Pattern	Observation
Always paired	Never stands alone — always immediately follows Al-Malik
Cosmic register	Both verses describe all creation (heavens, earth) glorifying Allah
Never petitionary	Never appears in a verse of supplication or request
Medinan context	Both surahs are late/Medinan — a mature theological setting

Textual Pairings

The Al-Malik Pairing (Qur’an)

This pairing is the single most revealing feature of the name, and it is never broken in either Qur’anic occurrence. It is a qualifying pair.

• Al-Malik establishes the fact of absolute sovereignty
• Al-Quddus establishes the quality of that sovereignty

Every human king shares certain defects: he needs advisors, resources, and taxes; he can be deceived, can err, can rule unjustly; he eventually dies or is overthrown; his authority is always mixed with compromise.

Al-Malik alone might invite comparison to human kings. Al-Quddus immediately forecloses that comparison.

The Pairing Kept in the Sunnah

After witr the Prophet ﷺ said Subḥānal-Malikil-Quddūs (section 5), ritually recreating the Qur’anic Al-Malik + Al-Quddus pairing in daily devotion — confirming the pairing was treated as meaningful, not incidental phrasing. In rukū’ and sujūd he joined it with another Name of glorification, Subbūḥ.

The Extended Chain in 62:1 (Qur’an)

Al-Jumu’ah adds two more names, producing a complete portrait of perfect kingship:

Name	Answers the question
Al-Malik	Who owns and rules?
Al-Quddus	Is that rule corrupt? (No.)
Al-Aziz	Can that rule be overthrown? (No.)
Al-Hakim	Is that power used wisely? (Yes.)

The As-Salam Pairing (Qur’an, 59:23 Only)

• Al-Quddus — free from imperfection within Himself
• As-Salam — free from harm, and the source from whom soundness flows

Two sides of one coin: inward purity, outward peace. The wider company in 59:23 also includes Al-Mu’min and Al-Muhaymin.

A Pairing That Never Occurs

Al-Quddus is never sequenced directly with Ar-Rahman or Al-Ghafur. It belongs to the register of transcendence and majesty (jalāl), not relational mercy (jamāl).

7. The Root and the Grammar

Root: Q-D-S ق د س

Core sense: purity, sanctity, freedom from blemish — moral and spiritual, not physical cleanliness. Ibn Fāris (Maqāyīs al-Lugha) centers the root on freedom from fault or unworthy attribute.

Derivatives

• Al-Quds القُدْس — holiness itself; also the name of Jerusalem, “the Holy [City]”
• Taqdīs تقديس — the act of sanctifying or declaring holy
• Nuqaddisu — “we sanctify You” — the angels’ words in Al-Baqarah 2:30
• Al-Arḍ al-Muqaddasah — “the Holy Land” (Al-Ma’idah 5:21)
• Rūḥ al-Qudus روح القدس — “the Spirit of Holiness,” i.e. Jibrīl (An-Nahl 16:102)

Form: Fu”ūl فُعُّول

The doubled middle radical (shaddah on the د) is the grammatical engine of this name. In Arabic morphology, doubling the middle root letter creates mubālaghah — intensification.

Form	Meaning
Plain participle	“one who is pure” — simple description
Quddūs (fu”ūl)	“pure to the absolute maximum, in every respect, without admixture”

Two things follow from the form alone:

1. The meaning is exclusionary — it removes imperfection rather than adding a positive quality (unlike Ar-Rahman, which adds mercy).
2. The purity is not relative — it is maximal and comprehensive, not partial.

Fu”ūl is an uncommon pattern among the 99 Names (most use fa’īl, e.g. Al-Alim, Ar-Rahim). Al-Quddus is grammatically distinctive — fitting for a name about being uniquely incomparable.

The Root Across Semitic Languages

This is descriptive linguistics — historically illuminating, not religiously authoritative. Cognates in other Semitic languages show how a root was used across cultures; they do not determine Qur’anic meaning.

Arabic q-d-s and Hebrew q-d-š both descend from Proto-Semitic *qudš- (“holy, sacred”). The root appears in Phoenician, Hebrew, Akkadian, Old South Arabian, and Ge’ez.

Hebrew parallel: qādōsh (קָדוֹשׁ), “holy,” from qādash, “to consecrate / set apart.” Derivatives of this root appear roughly 830 times in the Hebrew Bible. Exodus 15:11 — “Who is like You, O Lord… glorious in holiness?” — uses holiness to declare incomparability, precisely the function Al-Quddus performs in Arabic.

A meaningful split in the root. Vine’s Expository Dictionary identifies two strands: one signifying “pure/devoted” as a description of someone (Akkadian qadistu, Hebrew qādōsh), and another signifying holiness as an abstract state — citing Arabic al-quddūs specifically as the example. This aligns with the fu”ūl intensive form: Arabic leans toward holiness as a totalized condition of being.

The unresolved question — “separation” or “purification”? Older scholarship (BDB) treated the primitive sense as to separate. Recent Semitic scholarship leans toward consecration, belonging, purification. This ambiguity may explain why both readings coexist comfortably in Islamic tradition: the “separation” sense supports Rāzi’s tanzīh emphasis; the “purity” sense supports the freedom-from-defect reading dominant in tafsīr.

One linguistic curiosity: The Arabic verb qaddasa means both “to sanctify” and, idiomatically, “he went to Jerusalem” — with al-Quds becoming the standing Arabic name for the city, “the holy place.” Holiness and the Holy City fused linguistically across Semitic languages long before Islam.

8. What It Is Not

Imperfections It Excludes

Understanding this name through negation is often faster than through positive description. Al-Quddus excludes:

1. Resemblance to creation — no physical form, no magnified-human conception of God
2. Partners or offspring — no son, no wife, no co-divinity, no shared essence; 59:23 closes with “Exalted is Allah above whatever they associate with Him”
3. Need or deficiency — no need for food, rest, help, validation, or completion
4. Error, forgetfulness, or change of mind — all imply a prior imperfect state
5. Injustice — moral corruption would itself be an impurity in His rule; 62:1 pairs the Name with Al-Hakim, the Wise
6. Confinement to place — He is not “somewhere” the way creation occupies space

Names It Is Not

Al-Ghazālī groups Al-Quddus with other Names that describe Allah by negation, and separates them by what each one negates (al-Maqṣad al-Asnā, Burrell and Daher translation, p. 173).

Name	Core meaning	How it differs
Al-Quddus	Free from everything the senses perceive, the imagination conceives, or the mind can think	The widest negation. Al-Ghazālī says it transcends even the attributes creatures count as perfection, not only defects (pp. 59–60).
As-Salam	Free from defect in essence, attributes, and actions	Negates defects specifically, and adds an outward sense: everything sound in existence comes from Him (pp. 61–62). Al-Ghazālī notes the term can also mean the creature’s safety through Him.
Al-Ghaniyy	Free from need	Negates one thing, need, where Al-Quddus negates every limitation.

The two Names in 59:23 are close enough that some explanations treat them together; Al-Ghazālī’s line is that Al-Quddus looks inward to what He is, and As-Salam looks outward as well, to what flows from Him.

9. What the Scholars Say

Commentators

Scholar	Emphasis
At-Tabari (d. 923)	“At-Tāhir” — the Pure One; free from defect, free from wife or child. Direct and lexical.
Ibn Kathīr (d. 1373)	“Pure from every defect.” Anchors the name to the Prophet’s ﷺ personal dhikr in rukū’ and sujūd.
Al-Qurtubi (d. 1273)	Notes two valid vocalizations (Quddūs / Quddus). Argues the doubling signals comprehensiveness, not just degree.
Ar-Rāzi (d. 1210)	The most developed treatment — see below.
As-Sa’di (d. ~1956)	Ties the name devotionally to the believer’s tasbīḥ — saying “Subḥānallāh” enacts the meaning of Al-Quddus.
Al-Baghawi (d. 1122)	Brief and lexical; notes a secondary/weaker association with growth or barakah in some Semitic usages.
Al-Ghazālī (d. 1111)	al-Maqṣad al-Asnā: the Holy is free from every attribute the senses, imagination, or thought can reach — he declines even to say “free from defects,” since naming a defect to deny it already falls short.

Ar-Razi’s Meta-Name Argument

Rāzi distinguishes two dimensions of purity:

1. Tanzīh in Dhāt (Essence) — free from parts, composition, resemblance
2. Tanzīh in Ṣifāt (Attributes) — His knowledge, power, and will are free from the limitations those same qualities carry in created beings

His conclusion: Al-Quddus is not one perfection among many. It is a governing name that tells you how to read all the other names — His Knowledge, His Power, His Mercy are each Quddūs, untainted by the deficiencies you’d associate with those qualities in creation.

Scholars’ Grouping

• Majesty (Jalāl). The majesty/beauty contrast is classical; Ibn al-Qayyim uses it. Placing Al-Quddus under Majesty is this site’s study arrangement, following that contrast. See Scholars’ Grouping.
• Name of the Essence (Dhātiyyah). Holiness is an attribute Allah never ceases to have; it does not come and go (the essence/action division as set out by Ibn ʿUthaymīn, al-Qawā’id al-Muthlā).

The Four Schools

The four schools are schools of practice, not of belief; on what Al-Quddus means they do not hold separate positions. The one area where they rule on it is oaths:

The four schools agree. Swearing by a Name of Allah, such as Al-Quddus, is a binding oath (yamīn), with expiation (kaffārah) if it is broken (5:89). The Ḥanafīs hold this for any of His Names, whether or not people customarily swear by it (Ibn ʿĀbidīn, Radd al-Muḥtār 3/711–712, via IslamQA); the Mālikī al-Ḥaṭṭāb (Mawāhib al-Jalīl 4/399, via Mufti WP), the Shāfiʿī an-Nawawī (Rawḍat aṭ-Ṭālibīn 11/6), and the Ḥanbalī al-Bahūtī (Sharḥ Muntahā al-Irādāt 3/441) state the same (Jordan Iftaa’).

No school-specific ruling was found on the witr dhikr as it concerns this Name; it is practised as described in section 5.

10. Theological Weight

The exclusions in section 8 are what the Name rules out. Here is why several of them matter for belief:

• Tashbīh (anthropomorphism) — from item 1. The idea that God is a kind of enormous human being. This name is a primary textual anchor for rejecting any physical or creaturely conception of Allah.
• Shirk and claims of divine offspring — from item 2. Absolute, undivided holiness cannot be distributed among partners without becoming relative; 59:23 makes the point in the same breath.
• Divine need — from item 3. Supports Al-Ghaniyy al-Mutlaq: creation and command serve no need of His, since need is itself an imperfection. See Al-Ghaniyy.
• Imputing injustice to Allah — from item 5. A supporting proof in theodicy discussions, though Al-Adl and Al-Hakim are more central there.

One error is not on the section 8 list:

• Pantheism and process theology — excludes any model where Allah’s nature blends with creation, or changes or grows through interaction with it. Al-Ghazālī rejects the claim that a human can take on the holiness of the Lord by indwelling or union; a holy person is holy only by comparison with other people, never in relation to the holiness of the Lord (al-Maqṣad al-Asnā, Burrell and Daher translation, pp. 168–169).

11. The Name in Stories

The Angels Who Sanctify

When Allah told the angels He would place a successor (khalīfah) on earth, they asked: “Will You place upon it one who causes corruption therein and sheds blood, while we exalt You with praise and sanctify You (nuqaddisu laka)?” He answered: “Indeed, I know that which you do not know.”

The story uses the Name’s root, not the Name itself. The link to Al-Quddus comes from the Prophet ﷺ, who glorified Allah in bowing and prostration as Subbūḥun Quddūs, Rabb al-malā’ikati wa’r-rūḥ — “Glorified, Most Holy, Lord of the angels and the Spirit” — joining this Name to the angels by name.

The angels’ whole work is declaring His holiness, yet His answer shows that the holiness they declare is His and not theirs: even their knowledge falls short of His.

Sources: Al-Baqarah 2:30 · Sahih Muslim 487

12. Effect on the Heart

• Primary: Haybah — awe at incomparable purity. Awe is not fear: fear is of consequences, awe is of greatness itself.
• Secondary: Iftiqār — awareness of one’s own poverty and defect by contrast. Because He needs nothing, reflecting on this name sharpens awareness that every human quality — knowledge, strength, goodness — is borrowed, temporary, and flawed.
• Notably absent: Rajā’ (hope) and maḥabbah (love). Al-Quddus does not, by itself, produce hope or warmth.

The risk of reading it alone. Without a counterweight, a reading that “this should make me feel worthless” arises naturally. It is not a misreading of the name; it is what happens when the name is read alone. His purity is not only a standard that condemns, but a source one turns toward for purification. See Effect on the Heart for the ten states.

13. Living the Name

Classical scholars (notably Al-Ghazali in Al-Maqṣad al-Asnā) held that knowing a name is incomplete without ta’alluq — a corresponding shaping of character. Always imitation of effect, never equivalence of essence.

Category

A Name to embody, in proportion. The servant can have a holiness of his own, at a human scale; holiness in full belongs to Allah alone.

Al-Ghazālī’s Share

“The holiness of the servant lies in his freeing his knowledge and his will.” Free your knowledge from what you perceive in common with animals — imaginings and sense-impressions — and turn it toward what is lasting and divine. Free your will from circling around the pleasures of food, desire, and the body, until you want nothing but Allah (al-Maqṣad al-Asnā, Burrell and Daher translation, pp. 59–60).

In Practice

1. Purify your intention (ikhlāṣ). As Allah is free from admixture, worship should be free from admixture — from showing off (riyā’), self-interest, or divided motive.

2. Purify the heart (tazkiyah). Note the Qur’anic echo: Al-Quddus in 62:1 is followed immediately in 62:2 by the Messenger’s role in purifying people. Divine purity → human purification.

3. Recognize your own poverty (faqr). Let the contrast with His need for nothing remind you that what you have is borrowed.

4. Approach with awe, not casualness. Ibn al-Qayyim’s distinction: names of jamāl (beauty) invite intimacy; names of jalāl (majesty) invite reverence. Al-Quddus is firmly jalāl.

5. Keep your own authority uncorrupted. If uncorrupted sovereignty is the meaning of Al-Malik al-Quddus, then authority held in family, work, or community should be kept as free as possible from favoritism and self-interest.

Calling Upon Him by This Name

No duʿāʾ in the Qur’an or authentic hadith asks by this Name; its prophetic use is glorification. Two glorifications are established:

• In rukū’ and sujūd: Subbūḥun Quddūsun, Rabbul-malā’ikati war-Rūḥ — “Glorified and Most Holy, Lord of the angels and the Spirit” (Muslim 487).
• After witr, three times, raising the voice on the third: Subḥānal-Malikil-Quddūs — “Glory be to the Sovereign, the Most Holy” (an-Nasa’i 1699).

When asking for what this Name fits — purity of heart, of intention, of speech — call on Allah as Al-Quddus in your own words (7:180, “call upon Him by them”). It may be said on its own.

Guardrails

• Do not claim purity. “Do not claim purity for yourselves; He knows best who is mindful of Him” (53:32). The moment a person feels pure, the Name has been misread.
• Do not collapse into despair. The Name sets a standard; it does not close the door. That is what the counterweight below is for.

Study Pair and Counterweight

The site’s study suggestion, not a scriptural pairing. Read Al-Quddus alongside At-Tawwab or Al-Ghafur — even though the Qur’an never pairs them directly with Al-Quddus — so that awe at His purity is held together with hope in His turning and forgiveness. See The Balance Principle.

Reflection Prompts

• Where in my worship this week did I want to be seen by people?
• What did I call “good” in myself this week that was really borrowed from Him?
• After each prayer this week, pause on Subḥānal-Malikil-Quddūs and ask: is anything in the way I use my own authority unfit to be called pure?

Sources

Qur’an: 59:23, 62:1, 62:2, 2:30, 5:21, 16:102, 53:32, 5:89, 7:180. Translations adapted from Sahih International via Quran.com.

Hadith: Sahih Muslim 487 · Riyad as-Salihin 1426 · Sunan an-Nasa’i 1134, 1699, 1729, 1733, 1740, 1741 · Musnad Ahmad 26070–71

Tafsīr and works on the Names: at-Tabari, Jāmi’ al-Bayān; Ibn Kathīr, Tafsīr al-Qur’ān al-‘Aẓīm; al-Qurtubi, al-Jāmi’ li-Aḥkām al-Qur’ān; ar-Rāzi, Mafātīḥ al-Ghayb; as-Sa’di, Taysīr al-Karīm ar-Raḥmān; al-Baghawi, Ma’ālim at-Tanzīl; al-Ghazālī, al-Maqṣad al-Asnā (trans. D. Burrell and N. Daher, The Ninety-Nine Beautiful Names of God, Islamic Texts Society, 1992); Ibn ʿUthaymīn, al-Qawā’id al-Muthlā

Fiqh: Ibn ʿĀbidīn, Radd al-Muḥtār; al-Ḥaṭṭāb, Mawāhib al-Jalīl; an-Nawawī, Rawḍat aṭ-Ṭālibīn; al-Bahūtī, Sharḥ Muntahā al-Irādāt; summaries via Jordan Iftaa’, Mufti WP, IslamQA (Hanafi), and IslamQA 1692 on names reserved for Allah

Lexicons and linguistics: Ibn Fāris, Maqāyīs al-Lugha; Brown–Driver–Briggs (BDB), Hebrew and English Lexicon; Vine’s Expository Dictionary