Al-Kafi · Hadith 1

Original Arabic text

Published English translation

1. Ali ibn Muhammad has narrated from al-‘Abbas from h n Fadl ibn Shadhan ‘Abd al-Rahman from Sufyan al-Hariri from his father from Sa’d al-Khaffaf from abu Ja’far (a.s.) who has said the following: “O Sa’d, learn the Holy Quran; on the Day of Judgment the Holy Quran will come in the best form that people may have ever seen. People will be present in one hundred thousand and twenty rows: the followers of Prophet Muhammad will form eighty thousand rows. The other forty thousand rows will consist of the followers of the other prophets. The Holy Quran will come to the rows of the Muslims in the form of a well-shaped man, offer them the greeting of peace and they look to him and say to each other, ‘No one deserves to be worshipped except Allah, the forbearing the magnanimous, this man is one of the Muslims whom we know from his picture and qualities, however, he has been striving about the Holy Quran much harder than we, thus, he has been given this beauty, grace and light which we have not received. “He (the Quran in the form of a person) passes toward the row of the martyrs who look at him and say, ‘No one deserves to be worshipped except Allah, the Lord, the Merciful. We know from the signs and qualities he is a martyr, however, he has been of the martyrs at sea, thus, he has received this beauty and grace that is not given to us.’ The Imam said, ‘Then it will pass toward the martyr at sea and the martyrs at sea look at him with astonishment and say, “He is of the martyrs at sea; we know him from his signs and qualities, however, on the island where he suffered must have been much more dangerous than the island where we suffered, thus, he has received this beauty, grace and light.’ “Then he approaches the rows of the prophets and messengers in the form of a messenger prophet. The prophets and messengers look at him and their astonishment increase. They will say, ‘No one deserves to be worshipped except Allah, the Most Forbearing, the Magnanimous, this is a messenger prophet; we know him from his picture and qualities, however, he has been much more virtuous.’ The Imam said, ‘They will come to the Messenger of Allah and ask him, “O Muhammad, who is this?” He then will ask, ‘Do you not know him?’ They will say, ‘We do not know him, however, Allah has not been angry with him.’ The Messenger of Allah will say to them, ‘This is the authority of Allah over His creatures. He offers them greeting of peace and passes thereby to the rows of the angels in the form of a special angel. The angels will look at him and their astonishment increases, his status will seem very great to them. They will say our Lord is Most High, Most Holy. This servant is of the angels. We know him from his picture and qualities, however, he has been more close and special to Allah, the Most Majestic, the Most Holy, thus, he is dressed up with this much light and beauty that we have not received.’ Then he will come before Allah, the Most Majestic, the Most Blessed, the Most High, and will bow down below the Throne. “Allah, the Most Blessed, the Most High, will speak to the Holy Quran saying, ‘My true spoken words and authority on earth, look up and ask for your wishes. Your wishes shall be granted and your intercession shall be accepted. How did you find my servants?’ “The Holy Quran will then say, ‘My Lord, certain ones among them kept me safely protected and did not lose anything from me but others among them lost me and disrespected me and called me lies even though I was Your authority to all of Your creatures.’ Allah, the Most Majestic, the Most Holy, then will say, ‘I swear by My Majesty, Greatness and Highness that I shall give the best reward on this day because of you and shall punish severely because of you.’ “The Imam then continued saying, ‘The Holy Quran will raise his head in another shape.’ I (the narrator) asked the Imam, ‘O abu Ja’far in what shape it will return?’ The Imam said, ‘It will come in the shape of a changed man, slim and tired looking. People in the gathering will see him. Then he will come forward to one of our followers who knew it and would argue with it against the people, opposed to ‘A’immah. The Holy Quran will ask him, ‘Do you know me’? The man will look it (the Holy Quran) and say, ‘O servant of Allah, I do not know you.’ The Holy Quran then will return in his former shape with which it existed among people, and will ask, ‘Do you still not know me’? He will say, ‘Yes, I do know you.’ It will say, ‘I am the Holy Quran for which you kept the whole night awake and faced suffering in your life, hearing disappointing words from people when you spoke from me. Obviously every merchant enjoys the benefit of his trade. Today I am behind you with full support. The Holy Quran will then proceed with him to the Throne of the Lord of Majesty, the Most Blessed, the Most High, and the Quran then will say, ‘Lord, this servant of You was very close to me and very careful about me. He would love others because of me and hate others just because of me.’ “Allah, the Most Majestic, the Most Holy, will then say, ‘Allow my servant enter paradise and allow him be dressed and crowned and then let him come back to see his friend, the Quran.’ When that servant of Allah will be well rewarded he will then come back to see his friend the Holy Quran, Allah, the Most High will ask the Holy Quran, ‘Are you happy with Our rewards given to your friend?’ the Holy Quran will say, ‘Lord, I consider it is not enough and I request that he should receive more of all the good things. Allah then will say, ‘I swear by My Majesty, Honor and Highness, I shall reward him and others like him with five things and more: I shall give them eternal youth, good health free from illness, wealth free from poverty, happiness free from sadness and life free from death.’ “The Imam then read this verse: ‘They will not experience any death other than that which they have already been through.’ ( 44 : 56 ) “I (the narrator) then said to abu Ja’far (a.s.) ‘May Allah keep my soul in service for your cause, does the Holy Quran speak?’ The Imam smiled and said, ‘May Allah grant favors upon our weak Shi’a (followers), they are people of submission.’ Then he said, ‘Yes, O Sa’D, prayer speaks. It has a form and shape. It commands and prohibits.’ Sa’D then said, ‘It changed my color and I said, “I will not be able to speak of this among people.” Abu Ja’far (a.s.) said, ‘Are people anything else besides our Shi’a (followers)? Those who do not know the right of the prayer, they have denied our rights.’ The Imam then said, ‘O Sa’d do you want, I will make you hear the words of the Holy Quran?’ I said, ‘Yes, may Allah grant you favors.’ The Imam said, ‘Prayer prohibits indecency and unlawful matters and speaking of Allah is greater,’ “prohibition” is speaking, (stopping people from going to) “indecency and unlawful matters” (that) are (nothing else but certain) men. We are the Dhikr of Allah, speaking of Allah, and we are greater.’” (The Holy Quran prohibits people from following certain people called indecency and unlawful matters)

Narrator and transmission

See the transmission information preserved in the original source text.

Attributed scholarly assessments

Source, rights, and attribution

dataset Name

Thaqalayn public library, via ThaqalaynAPI snapshot

source Url

https://thaqalayn.com/hadith/2/3/1/1

license

Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0)

edition

Al-Kafi, volume 2, Thaqalayn digital edition / Muhammad Sarwar translation

imported At

2026-10-18T21:36:12.871Z

license Url

https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

rights Statement Url

https://thaqalayn.com/terms

attribution

Source: Thaqalayn (Stichting Thaqalayn). Compiler: Shaykh Muḥammad b. Yaʿqūb al-Kulaynī. Translation: Muhammad Sarwar. Data transport: MohammedArab1/ThaqalaynAPI. No endorsement implied.

translator

Muhammad Sarwar

source Revision

becbad600b693ce23735d7403c4126ce7c896d34

content Hash

9081ce4681e609bb840af3a7321e4bc85b0734c35da814b2e8aa2e95ea06b27d

source File Hash

d538c07d5f74e5fbc26b065897c076eab247d4d7c09e633fbb6184de9f37ee78

original Source Url

https://thaqalayn.net/hadith/1/3/1/1

changes

Arabic and English texts preserved verbatim from pinned snapshot. Compiler introduction excluded where present; references mapped to fields; assessment whitespace trimmed; source-supplied English sanad retained separately. Search normalization is not applied to displayed text. Snapshot URL's erroneous volume 1 segment corrected to volume 2 using the reviewed file/book/volume metadata and publisher chapter structure; original URL retained for audit.

verification Note

Publisher content rights, translator attribution and structural checks, with independent publisher-page spot checks—not scholarly authentication or printed-edition collation. Historical text and scholarly reference strings may contain source errors; they are not silently corrected. No full commentary prose or inferred narrator identity is added. Muʿjam coverage, where present, is only the supplied excerpt, not the complete work.