Alhamdulillah

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Alhamdulillah (Arabic: ٱلْحَمْدُ لِلَّٰهِ‎, al-Ḥamdu lillāh) is an Arabic phrase meaning “praise be to God“, sometimes translated as “thank God”.^[1] This phrase is called Tahmid (Arabic: تَحْمِيد‎, lit. ‘Praising’)^[2] or Hamdalah (Arabic: حَمْدَلَة‎).^[3] A longer variant of the phrase is al-ḥamdu l-illāhi rabbi l-ʿālamīn (ٱلْحَمْدُ لِلَّٰهِ رَبِّ ٱلْعَالَمِينَ), meaning “all praise is due to God, Lord of all the worlds”.

It is frequently used by Muslims of every background, due to its centrality to the texts of the Quran and Hadith—the words of the Islamic prophet Muhammad—and its meaning and in-depth explanation have been the subject of much exegesis. It is also commonly used by non-Muslim speakers of the Arabic language.

Meaning[edit]

Alhamdulillah written in Sini-Arabic script on an incense box, Qing Dynasty, 19th century, China. Adilnor Collection, Sweden.

The phrase has three basic parts:

• al-, the definite article, “the”.
• ḥamd(u), literally meaning “praise”, “commendation”.^[1]
• li-llāh(i), preposition + noun Allāh. Li- is a dative preposition.

The word Allāh (Arabic: ٱللَّٰه‎) means “The God”, and it is a contraction of the definite article al- and the word ʾilāh (Arabic: إِلَٰه‎, “god, deity”). As in English, the article is used here to single out the noun as being the only one of its kind, “the God” (the one and only) or “God”. Therefore, Allāh is the Arabic word for “God”. ʾilāh is the Arabic cognate of the ancient Semitic name for God, El.

The phrase is first found in the second verse of the first sura of the Qur’an (Al-Fatiha). So frequently do Muslims and Arabic-speaking Jews and Christians invoke this phrase that the quadriliteral verb hamdala (Arabic: حَمْدَلَ‎), “to say al-ḥamdu li-llāh” was coined, and the derived noun ḥamdalah (Arabic: حَمْدَلَة‎) is used as a name for this phrase.^[1]

The triconsonantal root Ḥ-M-D (Arabic: ح م د‎), meaning “praise”, can also be found in the names Muhammad, Mahmud, Hamid and Ahmad.

Translation[edit]

English translations of alhamdulillah include:

• “all praise is due to God alone” (Muhammad Asad)
• “all the praises and thanks be to Allah” (Muhammad Muhsin Khan)
• “praise be to Allah” (Abdullah Yusuf Ali, Marmaduke Pickthall)
• “all praise is due to Allah” (Saheeh International)
• “All perfect praises belong to the Almighty alone.” (A. R. Rahman)

Variants[edit]

Various Islamic phrases include the Tahmid, most commonly:

Use in other historical sources[edit]

Jabir ibn Abd-Allah wrote in a hadith that Muhammad, said: “The best remembrance of God is to repeat lā ʾilāha ʾillā llāh and the best prayer (du’a) is al-ḥamdu li-llāh.” (Narrated by Nasa’i, Ibn Majah, and Hakim who declared its chain ‘sound’.) Abu Huraira wrote that Muhammad said: “Any matter of importance which is not begun with al-ḥamdu li-llāh remains defective.” From Abu Dawood. Anas bin Malik wrote that Muhammad said: “God is pleased with his slave who says, al-ḥamdu li-llāh when he takes a morsel of food and drinks a draught of water.”^{[citation needed]}

See also[edit]

Look up God willing in Wiktionary, the free dictionary.

• Tasbih
• Tahlil
• Takbir
• Tasmiyah
• Salawat
• Peace be upon him
• Shahadah
• Glossary of Islam
• Hadha min fadli Rabbi
• Hosanna
• Hallelujah