Ar-Rahman
Ar-Rahman is the mercy that arrives before it is asked for — the mercy that reaches every creature alive, believer and disbeliever alike, simply because Allah is merciful.
Name 1 of 99
الرَّحْمَنُ
Ar-Rahman
The Most Merciful
- In Arabic
- الرَّحْمَنُ
- Transliteration
- Ar-Rahman
- Position in the list
- Name 1 of 99
Ar-Rahman — The Most Merciful
What the name means
Ar-Rahman comes from the root r-h-m, the same root as rahim, the womb — a word Arabic uses for the place where a life is sheltered and fed before it can ask for anything. The form rahman is one of intensity and scope: not merely one who shows mercy, but one whose mercy is vast, immediate and overflowing.
It is the only one of the ninety-nine that Arabic reserves for Allah alone. A man may be called karim or halim, but never rahman, and the Quran pairs it with the throne and with the act of teaching the Quran itself, as though to say that everything given to creation comes from this attribute first.
Ar-Rahman and Ar-Rahim
The two names open every surah together, and scholars have long read them as distinct rather than repeated. Ar-Rahman is mercy in its breadth — the sun that rises on everyone, the rain that falls on every field. Ar-Rahim is mercy in its depth and its constancy, the mercy Allah keeps for the believers in this life and the next.
Read that way, the basmala says something exact: the One whose mercy reaches all, and who is especially merciful to those who turn to Him.
Living by this name
A servant cannot share in this name, but can respond to it. The Prophet ﷺ said that Allah shows mercy to those who show mercy to others, and tied the treatment of people on earth to the mercy received from above.
Practically it means beginning with mercy rather than judgement — with your family, with those who have wronged you, with yourself when you have sinned and assume the door is shut. Ar-Rahman is the answer to that assumption.
Ar-Rahman in the Quran
The 3 verses below contain this name. Every reference is checked against the Arabic text of the Quran before it is published, so Ar-Rahman really is in each verse it is cited from.
ٱلرَّحْمَٰنِ ٱلرَّحِيمِ
The Entirely Merciful, the Especially Merciful,
Surah Al-Fatihah 1:3Read the full surah →ٱلرَّحْمَٰنُ عَلَى ٱلْعَرْشِ ٱسْتَوَىٰ
The Most Merciful [who is] above the Throne established.
Surah Ta-Ha 20:5Read the full surah →بِسْمِ ٱللَّهِ ٱلرَّحْمَٰنِ ٱلرَّحِيمِ ٱلرَّحْمَٰنُ
The Most Merciful
Surah Ar-Rahman 55:1Read the full surah →
How reliable is the list of ninety-nine?
That Allah has ninety-nine names is established in Sahih al-Bukhari and Sahih Muslim, and both are agreed upon. The specific enumeration — this list of ninety-nine — comes from a narration in Jami' at-Tirmidhi that at-Tirmidhi himself called gharib, and which many hadith scholars grade weak; several held that a narrator compiled the names by searching the Quran and Sunnah. Classical scholars including al-Khattabi, Ibn Hazm, al-Qurtubi and al-Ghazali compiled lists of their own that differ from it. None of this touches the names themselves, every one of which is established elsewhere; it means the count of exactly these ninety-nine is a scholarly arrangement rather than a revealed roster, and Allah's names are not limited to them.
Questions about Ar-Rahman
Ar-Rahman (الرَّحْمَنُ) means "The Most Merciful". Like every one of the ninety-nine names, it describes an attribute of Allah rather than serving as a label — the names are how the Quran teaches who Allah is.
Yes. This page cites 3 verses containing Ar-Rahman, each checked against the Arabic text before publishing.
Address Allah with "Ya" before the name — "Ya Rahman" — and ask for what that attribute gives. The Quran instructs it directly: "To Allah belong the most beautiful names, so call upon Him by them" (7:180).
It is number 1 in the well-known list. The order comes from the narration of at-Tirmidhi and is a scholarly arrangement, so numbering can differ slightly between printed lists — the names themselves do not.