Understanding Allah’s Names and Attributes - Rule #3
July 20, 2006 — ibnabeeomarAllah’s Names and Attributes are unlimited in number, even though what we know of His Attributes is more than His Names.
The Prophet (saw) said, “Allah has 99 names (100 minus 1), whoever memorizes (enumerates) them will enter Paradise” [Bukhari/Muslim].
This is the authentic version. The inauthentic version continues on to list all 99 names. This addition was added by the narrator Waleed bin Muslim, and his students thought it was a part of the hadith. The narration with this addition is found in Tirmidhi, and Tirmidhi himself after recording it ruled that this hadith was weak. And this grading is almost unanimous amongst the scholars of hadith.
What this hadith means, that out of Allah’s INFINITE names, there are 99 specifically which if you memorize them you will enter Paradise.
No scholar has ever said there are only 99, and no Sahabah ever asked, which 99 are they. The point is to learn as much about Allah(swt) as we possibly can. Going through just the Qur’an one can find Allah) has well over 99 Names. Another proof that Allah (swt) has an infinite number of Names is the following dua of the Prophet (saw), “O Allaah, I am Your servant, son of Your servant, son of Your maidservant, my forelock is in Your hand, Your command over me is forever executed and Your decree over me is just. I ask You by every name belonging to You which You name Yourself with, or revealed in Your Book, or You taught to any of Your creation, or You have preserved in the knowledge of the unseen with You, that You make the Qur’aan the life of my heart and the light of my breast, and a departure for my sorrow and a release for my anxiety.’”
This seemed to be a confusing issue in class, so i thought of an analogy: Think of an bag full of an unknown number of M&M’s, and say you know that 15 of these M&M’s are green. This doesn’t mean that there’s only 15 M&M’s, or that all the M&M’s are green. It just means that out of the M&M’s in that bag, there’s 15 green ones. That’s it. It’s not confusing.
July 20, 2006 at 2:41 pm
This seemed to be a confusing issue in class, so i thought of an analogy: Think of an bag full of infinite M&M’s, and say you know that 15 of these infinite M&M’s are green. This doesn’t mean that there’s only 15 M&M’s, or that all the M&M’s are green. It just means that out of the infinite number of M&M’s, there’s 15 green ones. That’s it. It’s not confusing.
“Wa liLahil mathalul a3laa”
July 20, 2006 at 2:52 pm
Also omer…on top of that…these 15 green M&Ms are the only ones you know of that are green….since there are infinte M&Ms its also possible to say there are infinite green M&Ms….Allahu Alim
“Wa liLahil mathalul a3laa”
July 20, 2006 at 2:54 pm
Did Yasir mention the hadith of shafa’a of the Day of Judgement to start as a proof for this???
July 20, 2006 at 2:57 pm
yes, specifically the part about how Allah(swt) will teach the Prophet(saw) praises that he does not yet know.
January 21, 2007 at 6:12 pm
“Allah’s Names and Attributes are unlimited in number, even though what we know of His Attributes is more than His Names.”
Do you mean what we know of his attributes outnumber (is more than) what we know of his names?
Or
That his attributes outnumber His names?
Jazak Allahy khair in advance!
January 22, 2007 at 10:27 am
It means just that the Names/Attributes of Allah are infinite. we do not know all of them, we only know some - but out of what we know, we know more of His Attributes than Names.
i hope that makes sense but if it doesn’t please post here maybe someone can explain it better inshallah.