Tafseer of Surah Al-Fatiha

(1) This means: I begin with every Name of Allah, the Most High. This is since the word "Name" is singular and in the genitive form; therefore, it includes all of Allah's Beautiful and Perfect Names. "Allah", He is the God who is worshipped: the one deserving worship to the exclusion of everything else because of His qualities of divinity, all of which are perfect. "The Entirely Merciful, the Especially Merciful". These are two Names proving that He, Most High, is one who possesses a great and all-encompassing mercy that covers everything and includes every living being. He has decreed it for those who obey Allah, those who follow His Prophets and Messengers: these have unrestricted mercy. Everyone else has a portion of this mercy. Know that one of the principles agreed upon by the early scholars of Islam and their Imams is to have faith in Allah and His Attributes, and in the rules determining how they are to be understood. So, for example, they believe that he is the Entirely Merciful and the Especially Merciful; possessing the quality of mercy which is extended to its recipients.

Therefore, all blessings are from the results of this mercy. This principle holds true for all of His Names. It is said concerning the Name, All-Knowing: He is All-Knowing, possessing the quality of knowledge by which He knows everything. He is All-Capable, possessing the quality of ability which makes Him capable of doing anything.

(2) "All praise and thanks is only for Allah", this verse praises Allah with His perfect Attributes and His actions, all of which are based upon beneficence and justice. To Him belongs perfect and complete praise in every sense. "Lord of the worlds", the Lord is the One who nourishes and sustains the whole of the creation, meaning everything besides Allah, by the very fact of His creating them, His preparing for them the means, and Him blessing them with immense blessings, the absence of which would make their existence impossible. Thus, every blessing they possess, it is from Him, the Most High.

(3) His sustaining of the creation is of two types: general and specific. The general refers to His creating the creation, providing for them, and guiding them to all that they need in order to survive in this worldly life. The specific refers to His sustaining His sincere slaves with faith, guiding them to submit to it, perfecting and completing it for them, keeping away everything which may affect it. The reality of this is: Guiding them to every good and protecting them from all evil. Perhaps it was due to this that most of the supplications made by the prophets used the word 'Rabb': all they requested was covered by His specific lordship. His saying "Lord of the worlds"; He alone is the Creator and that all affairs are regulated by Him as is the provision of blessings. It also proves that He is completely Rich Beyond Need and that creation is in total and dire need of Him alone in every sense and in every possible way.

(4) "Owner of the Day of Judgement". The master is a person who has the quality of ownership, from the consequences of which is the ability to command and prohibit, reward and punish, and to behave with his subjects and possessions in any way he wishes. The Master of the Day of Judgement, the Day of Rising, the Day on which man will be judged for his actions the good and the bad. This is because on that day the completeness and perfection of His mastery, justice, and wisdom will be made clear to all. Moreover, it will be the end of the worldly masters, so much so that kings, ministers, slaves and the free-born will all be the same: all of them submissive to His greatness, rendered in complete submission before His honor, expectant of His recompense, hoping for His reward and fearing His punishment. The point of mentioning His mastery in this context is to emphasize it; otherwise, He is Master of the Day of Judgement and all other days.

5) "You Alone we worship and You Alone we ask for help", meaning that we single You out alone for worship and seeking help. This is because mentioning the object at the head of a verb is a method of constraint (hasr), i.e. affirming what is mentioned in the sentence and negating it for anything that falls outside. Therefore, it is as if the person has said, we worship You and we do not worship anything else. We ask You for help and we do not turn to anyone else for help.’

Mentioning worship before asking for help is by way of mentioning the general before the specific, and to show that attention should be given to His right over the right of His slave. Worship is "a collective noun that subsumes all actions and sayings, outward and inward, that Allah loves and is pleased with. Seeking help, isti`ana, is "to depend upon Allah, Most High, in acquiring that which would benefit and repressing that which would harm, along with having the certainty that He will actually assist the one asking"

Establishing the worship of Allah and seeking His help are the means to everlasting happiness and security from all evil; there is no path to victory except by meeting the requirements of these two pillars. Worship can only be considered to be true worship when done in the way taught by the Messenger seeking thereby only Allah's Face. These two conditions have to be present for the action to be considered worship. Seeking help has been mentioned after worship even though it is a part of worship because the slave is always in need of Allah's help in all acts of worship: if Allah does not help him, he will not achieve the goals he hopes to attain by enacting the obligations and avoiding the prohibitions.

(6) "Guide us to and on the Straight Path" means show us, direct us to it, and grant us the divine grace to traverse it. The Straight Path is the clear path that leads to Allah and His Paradise: it is the knowing the truth and acting by it. Therefore, the verse means: guide us to the Path and guide us in the Path. Guidance to the Path means to come to Islam and abandon all other religions. Guidance in the Path means guidance towards all of the details of Islam in terms of knowledge and action. Hence, this supplication is one of the most comprehensive and most beneficial supplications, and this is why it is obligatory to supplicate to Allah with it in every unit of prayer, especially since the servant is in continuous need of it.

(7) This Straight Path is "the Path of those You have blessed" who are the Prophets, the Sincerely Truthful, the Martyrs and the Righteous "not" the path "of those who have incurred anger" who knew the truth but abandoned it such as the Jews and others, "nor" the path "of those astray" who abandoned the truth out of ignorance and misguidance such as the Christians.

This chapter known as surah al Fatiha, despite being short, has covered what no other chapter of the Qur´an has. It mentions the three types of Tawhid: Tawhid al-Rububiyyah, (Oneness of Allah’s Lordship), derived from His saying, "Lord of all the worlds"; Tawhid al-Ilaahiyyah, (Oneness of Worship), which is to single out Allah Alone for worship, derived from the word "Allah" and from His saying "You Alone we worship and You Alone we ask for help"; and Tawhid al-Asma´ wa’l-Sifat, (Oneness of the Names and Attributes), which is to affirm the Attributes of Perfection for Allah, Most High, which He has affirmed for Himself and His Messenger has affirmed for Him, without ta`til (denying the Attributes), or tamthil and tashbih (likening the Attributes to creation) as is proven by His saying, "all praise and thanks" as already mentioned.

It also affirms Prophethood in His saying "guide us to and on the Straight Path" because this guidance is not possible without a message. It affirms recompense for ones actions in His saying "Master of the Day of Judgement"” and it affirms that this recompense will be established upon justice, this is because the meaning of ‘"deen"’ is recompense founded upon justice. It affirms Qadr (the divine decree) and that the slave is the true performer of his actions opposing the stances of the Qadariyyah, those who deny Qadr, and Jabariyyah, those who negate the will of the person. In fact this surah refutes all the people of innovation and misguidance in His saying "Guide us to and on the Straight Path" because this is knowing the truth and enacting it, and every innovator and misguided person contradicts this. It enjoins making the religion sincerely for Allah in terms of worship and seeking help in His saying "You Alone we worship and You Alone we ask for help".

All praise and thanks are for Allah, Lord of everything that exists.