Surah Yunus

Yunus, "Jonah", is the tenth surah of the Quran. A Meccan surah of 109 verses, it is 51st in the traditional order of revelation. It defends the truth of the Quran and of the Prophet's mission, points to the signs of God in creation, and recalls the fate of the peoples of Noah and Pharaoh, and of the people of Jonah, the only nation spared after believing at the last moment.

Name

The surah takes its name from verse 98, which mentions the people of Jonah: they believed when the punishment was upon them, and it was lifted. The story of Jonah and the whale itself is told in Al-Anbiya (21:87–88) and As-Saffat (37:139–148). Of Jonah, the Prophet ﷺ said: "No one should say that I am better than Yunus son of Matta" (al-Bukhari 3416). Yunus is also the first of the surahs that open with the letters Alif Lam Ra.

Main themes

• The astonishment of the Meccans that revelation should come to a man from among them (10:2).
• God's signs in creation: He made the sun a radiance and the moon a light, with phases for counting the years (10:5).
• Human ingratitude: people call on God alone when a storm strikes at sea, then forget Him once they are safe (10:22–23).
• The challenge to produce a single surah like it (10:38), and the Quran as "an exhortation from your Lord, a healing for what is in the hearts, guidance and mercy for the believers" (10:57).
• The friends of God, on whom "there is no fear, nor shall they grieve" (10:62).
• Noah and his people (10:71–73); Moses and Pharaoh, the magicians, the crossing of the sea, and Pharaoh's belated profession of faith as he drowned, his body preserved as a sign for those after him (10:75–92).
• Freedom of belief: "Would you compel people until they become believers?" (10:99).
• A closing call to follow the revelation and to be patient until God judges (10:109).

Notable verse

"For those who do good there is the best reward, and more" (10:26). Muslim (181) reports that the Prophet recited this verse after speaking of the people of Paradise being granted the sight of their Lord, the "more" being understood as that vision.

Yunus is followed in the Mushaf by Hud, revealed just after it, which takes up the same themes with fuller accounts of the earlier prophets.