Tafseer of The Family of Imraan · Aal-i-Imraan · 3:35
[Mention, O Muhammad], when the wife of 'Imran said, "My Lord, indeed I have pledged to You what is in my womb, consecrated [for Your service], so accept this from me. Indeed, You are the Hearing, the Knowing."
Important: The Arabic source text is always authoritative. This translation is a study aid and has not been verified by scholars — do not use it as a basis for religious proof or for deriving rulings (ahkam). When in doubt, always consult the Arabic text and a qualified scholar.
The discourse on the explanation of His statement: إِذْ قَالَتِ امْرَأَةُ عِمْرَانَ رَبِّ إِنِّي نَذَرْتُ لَكَ مَا فِي بَطْنِي مُحَرَّرًا فَتَقَبَّلْ مِنِّي إِنَّكَ أَنْتَ السَّمِيعُ الْعَلِيمُ (3:35)
(When the wife of ʿImrān said: "My Lord, I have dedicated to You what is in my womb, set free for Your service; so accept it from me. Truly, You are the All-Hearing, the All-Knowing." (3:35))
He, exalted is His praise, means by His word "When the wife of ʿImrān said: My Lord, I have dedicated to You what is in my womb, set free; so accept it from me": the word "when" (idh) is connected to "All-Hearing" (samīʿ).
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As for "the wife of ʿImrān": she is the mother of Maryam, the daughter of ʿImrān, and the mother of ʿĪsā the son of Maryam — the blessings of Allah be upon him. Her name was, according to what has been transmitted to us, Ḥanna, the daughter of Fāqūdh ibn Qatīl. Thus:
6856 — Muḥammad ibn Ḥumayd related it to us, he said: Salama related to us, on the authority of Ibn Isḥāq, concerning her lineage. And someone other than Ibn Ḥumayd said: the daughter of Fāqūd — with a dāl — ibn Qabīl.
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As for her husband "ʿImrān": he is ʿImrān ibn Yāshhim ibn Amūn ibn Manshā ibn Ḥizqiyā ibn Aḥzīq ibn Yūtham ibn ʿAzāriyā ibn Amṣiyā ibn Yāwush ibn Aḥzīhū ibn Yāram ibn Yahfāshāṭ ibn Asābir ibn Abiyā ibn Raḥbaʿam ibn Sulaymān ibn Dāwūd ibn Īshā. Thus:
6857 — Ibn Ḥumayd related to us, he said: Salama related to us, on the authority of Ibn Isḥāq, concerning his lineage.
* * *
As for His word "My Lord, I have dedicated to You what is in my womb, set free (muḥarraran)": the meaning of that is: I have made a vow (nadhr) to You, O Lord, that what is in my womb belongs to You, set free for Your worship. By this she means: I have designated it for the service of You and for the service of Your sanctuary in the church, set free from the service of everything else besides You, dedicated exclusively to You.
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The word "muḥarraran" (set free) is in the accusative as a circumstantial qualifier (ḥāl) referring to that which is contained in the relative pronoun by the mention of "that which" (alladhī).
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"So accept it from me," that is to say: so accept from me what I have promised You, O Lord. "Truly, You are the All-Hearing, the All-Knowing," that is to say: truly, You, O Lord, are "the All-Hearing" of what I say and call upon, and "the All-Knowing" of what I intend and aim at within myself; nothing remains hidden from You, neither the secret of my affair nor what is public.
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The occasion of the vow of Ḥanna, the daughter of Fāqūdh, the wife of ʿImrān — whom Allah mentions in this verse — was, according to what has reached us, the following:
6858 — Ibn Ḥumayd related it to us, he said: Salama related to us, he said: Muḥammad ibn Isḥāq related to me, he said: Zakariyyā and ʿImrān married two sisters. The mother of Yaḥyā was with Zakariyyā, and the mother of Maryam was with ʿImrān. ʿImrān died while the mother of Maryam was pregnant with Maryam, who was still an unborn child in her womb. He said: And she had, according to what they claim, remained childless until she had grown old, and they were a household held in honor before Allah, exalted is His praise. While she was once sitting in the shade of a tree, she looked at a bird feeding its chick, and her longing for a child was stirred. She implored Allah to grant her a child, and she became pregnant with Maryam, and ʿImrān died. When she knew that there was an unborn child in her womb, she made it a vow to Allah. And "the vow" (al-nadhīra) was that she would dedicate it to Allah in service, and make it one secluded in the church, from which no one would derive any worldly benefit.
6859 — Ibn Ḥumayd related to us, he said: Salama related to us, on the authority of Ibn Isḥāq, on the authority of Muḥammad ibn Jaʿfar ibn al-Zubayr, he said — and then he mentioned the wife of ʿImrān and her word: "My Lord, I have dedicated to You what is in my womb, set free" —, that is to say: I have dedicated it; she says: I have set it free for the worship of Allah, so that no one derives any worldly benefit from it. "So accept it from me. Truly, You are the All-Hearing, the All-Knowing."
6860 — ʿAbd al-Raḥmān ibn al-Aswad al-Ṭufāwī related to me, he said: Muḥammad ibn Rabīʿa related to us, he said: al-Naḍr ibn ʿArabī related to us, on the authority of Mujāhid, concerning His word "muḥarraran" (set free), he said: a servant for the church (al-bīʿa).
6861 — Abū Kurayb related to us, he said: Jābir ibn Nūḥ related to us, on the authority of al-Naḍr ibn ʿArabī, on the authority of Mujāhid, he said: a servant for the church.
6862 — Abū Kurayb related to us, he said: Jābir ibn Nūḥ related to us, he said: Ismāʿīl informed us, on the authority of al-Shaʿbī, concerning His word "I have dedicated to You what is in my womb, set free," he said: I have set it free for worship.
6863 — Yaʿqūb ibn Ibrāhīm related to me, he said: Hushaym related to us, he said: Ismāʿīl ibn Abī Khālid informed us, on the authority of al-Shaʿbī, concerning His word "I have dedicated to You what is in my womb, set free," he said: I have placed it in the church and set it free for worship.
6864 — Al-Muthannā related to me, he said: ʿAmr ibn ʿAwn related to us, he said: Hushaym informed us, on the authority of Ismāʿīl, on the authority of al-Shaʿbī, something similar.
6865 — Muḥammad ibn ʿAmr related to me, he said: Abū ʿĀṣim related to us, on the authority of ʿĪsā, on the authority of Ibn Abī Najīḥ, on the authority of Mujāhid, concerning His word "I have dedicated to You what is in my womb, set free," he said: for the church, to serve it.
6866 — Al-Muthannā related to me, he said: Abū Ḥudhayfa related to us, he said: Shibl related to us, on the authority of Ibn Abī Najīḥ, on the authority of Mujāhid, the same.
6867 — Ibn Wakīʿ related to us, he said: my father related to us, on the authority of Sufyān, on the authority of Khuṣayf, on the authority of Mujāhid: "I have dedicated to You what is in my womb, set free," he said: pure, with which nothing of worldly affairs is mingled.
6868 — Ibn Ḥumayd related to us, he said: Ḥakkām related to us, on the authority of ʿAmr, on the authority of ʿAṭāʾ, on the authority of Saʿīd ibn Jubayr: "I have dedicated to You what is in my womb, set free," he said: for the place of prayer and the church.
6869 — Al-Muthannā related to me, he said: al-Ḥimmānī related to us, he said: Sharīk related to us, on the authority of Sālim, on the authority of Saʿīd: "I have dedicated to You what is in my womb, set free," he said: set free for worship.
6870 — Bishr related to us, he said: Yazīd related to us, he said: Saʿīd related to us, on the authority of Qatāda, concerning His word "When the wife of ʿImrān said: My Lord, I have dedicated to You what is in my womb, set free," the verse: the wife of ʿImrān had set free for Allah what was in her womb. They used to set free only the male children, and the one set free, when he was set free, was placed in the church, which he did not leave; he attended to it and swept it.
6871 — Al-Ḥasan ibn Yaḥyā related to us, he said: ʿAbd al-Razzāq informed us, he said: Maʿmar informed us, on the authority of Qatāda, concerning His word "I have dedicated to You what is in my womb, set free," he said: she dedicated her child to the church.
6872 — Mūsā related to me, he said: ʿAmr related to us, he said: Asbāṭ related to us, on the authority of al-Suddī: "When the wife of ʿImrān said: My Lord, I have dedicated to You what is in my womb, set free; so accept it from me. Truly, You are the All-Hearing, the All-Knowing," he said: and that was because the wife of ʿImrān became pregnant and supposed that what was in her womb was a boy, so she bestowed him upon Allah, set free, not occupied with the world.
6873 — Al-Muthannā related to me, he said: Isḥāq related to us, he said: Ibn Abī Jaʿfar related to us, on the authority of his father, on the authority of al-Rabīʿ, he said: the wife of ʿImrān had set free for Allah what was in her womb. He said: and they used to set free only the male children, and the one set free, when he was set free, was placed in the church, which he did not leave; he attended to it and swept it.
6874 — It was related to me on the authority of al-Ḥusayn ibn al-Faraj, he said: I heard Abū Muʿādh saying: ʿUbayd informed us, he said: I heard al-Ḍaḥḥāk concerning His word "I have dedicated to You what is in my womb, set free," he said: she dedicated her child to Allah and to those who study the Book and learn it.
6875 — Al-Qāsim related to us, he said: al-Ḥusayn related to us, he said: Ḥajjāj related to me, on the authority of Ibn Jurayj, on the authority of al-Qāsim ibn Abī Bazza, that he informed him on the authority of ʿIkrima — and Abū Bakr, on the authority of ʿIkrima — that the wife of ʿImrān was an old, barren woman, named Ḥanna, and she bore no children. She began to envy the women for their children, and said: "O Allah, upon me is a vow of thanksgiving: if You grant me a child, then I shall dedicate it as alms to Jerusalem (Bayt al-Maqdis), that it may be among its servants and keepers." He said: and His word "I have dedicated to You what is in my womb, set free" — truly, she is the free woman, the daughter of free people — "set free" for the church, to serve it.
6876 — Muḥammad ibn Sinān related to me, he said: Abū Bakr al-Ḥanafī related to us, on the authority of ʿAbbād ibn Manṣūr, on the authority of al-Ḥasan, concerning His word "When the wife of ʿImrān said," the entire verse, he said: she dedicated what was in her womb, and then released it (sayyabathā).
