اسحاق

Core meaning

Proper noun. The text gives it to a birth that came at the farthest reach of all expectation, when his father and mother were past the age of having a child. The name has the letters of سحق, remoteness, though the text itself does not make this connection. The translation writes the name alone: "Ishaq".

Uses

1. إِسْحَٰق → "Ishaq" : the son announced to Ibrahim and his wife, father of Yaacoub.

   • «فَبَشَّرْنَٰهَا بِإِسْحَٰقَ» — "We then gave her the glad tidings of Ishaq" (11:71)
   • «وَبَشَّرْنَٰهُ بِإِسْحَٰقَ نَبِيًّۭا مِّنَ ٱلصَّٰلِحِينَ» — "And We gave him glad tidings of Ishaq, an informant among those who are sound" (37:113)

Evidence from the text

No word of its context explains the name, but the accounts of the announcement and the father's thanksgiving state the same distance. The mother: "Shall I bear a child, when I am old, and here is my husband, an old man?" (11:72); and in the other account, where the announced boy is not named: "An old, barren woman?!" (51:29). The father: "Praise be to God, who has bestowed on me, despite old age, Isma'il and Ishaq!" (14:39).

The word سحق, in its two uses, says remoteness: "a far-off place" (22:31), "so away with the companions of the Inferno!" (67:11). The text does not itself apply it to the name.

Distinctions

• سحق — remoteness in general, in space or in relation

See also

ابراهيم (Ibrahim) · يعقوب (Yaacoub)