Prophet Zakariya (AS) – The Guardian of Maryam and the Father of Yahya حضرت زکریا علیہ السلام – مریم کے کفیل اور یحییٰ کے والد

Zakariya lived in the last centuries before Isa (AS), when the Children of Israel had returned from exile and rebuilt their sanctuary in Jerusalem but had again grown hard of heart. Their scholars had divided into sects, their rulers were subject to foreign powers, and many of them had turned the religion of Musa into a set of rituals and a source of income. In this age Allah raised among them a prophet who was, by every account, gentle, devoted and poor.

The Quran names Zakariya among the guided prophets: 'And Zakariya and Yahya and Isa and Ilyas, and all were of the righteous' (Al-Anam 6:85). He was of the descendants of Harun, the brother of Musa, and of the priestly families who served in the sanctuary. The Prophet ﷺ told his Companions something about how Zakariya lived: 'Zakariya was a carpenter' (Sahih Muslim 2379). Like Dawud, who made armour, and like the Prophet ﷺ himself, who herded sheep, Zakariya earned his living with his hands. A prophet of the sanctuary who could have lived on its offerings chose instead to work wood.

His wife was, according to the historians, Ishba (Elizabeth in the Christian tradition), and she was of the same priestly family. The scholars differ on her exact relationship to Maryam: many say she was Maryam's maternal aunt, others that she was Maryam's sister. The Prophet ﷺ, describing his meeting with the prophets on the night of the Miraj, said that in the second heaven he met 'Yahya and Isa, the two sons of the maternal aunt' (Sahih al-Bukhari 3887; Sahih Muslim 162), which establishes that Yahya and Isa were cousins through their mothers. Beyond this, the details of the family are from the historians.

Zakariya and his wife had grown old together without children. The Quran records his own description of his condition: 'My Lord, indeed my bones have weakened, and my head has filled with white, and never have I been in my supplication to You, my Lord, unhappy' (Maryam 19:4). His wife was barren, and in the reckoning of the world the matter was closed. A man of his age with a wife who had never conceived did not expect children.

But his concern was not only for himself. He looked at his relatives, the men who would inherit the care of the sanctuary and the knowledge of the Book after him, and he was afraid. 'And indeed, I fear the successors after me, and my wife has been barren' (Maryam 19:5). The commentators explain that he feared they would not uphold the religion, that they would neglect the Tawrah, alter it or use it for worldly gain, as so many of the scholars of his time had done. He wanted an heir not to carry his name but to carry his trust.

This is the man the Quran shows us before the story of his prayer begins: an old carpenter-prophet, faithful in his worship, poor in the world, without children, anxious not for his property but for the religion of Allah among his people. Into his care Allah was about to place a child who was not his own, and through her, He would show him that nothing is beyond His power.

The story of Zakariya in Surah Aal Imran begins not with him but with the wife of Imran, the mother of Maryam. Pregnant and longing to dedicate her child to Allah, she vowed: 'My Lord, indeed I have pledged to You what is in my womb, consecrated for Your service, so accept this from me' (Aal Imran 3:35). She had expected a son, for service in the sanctuary was the work of men; when she gave birth to a daughter, she said, 'My Lord, I have delivered a female,' and Allah, the Quran remarks, knew best what she had delivered, 'and the male is not like the female.' She named her Maryam and sought refuge for her and her descendants with Allah from Satan the expelled (Aal Imran 3:36).

'So her Lord accepted her with good acceptance and caused her to grow in a good manner and put her in the care of Zakariya' (Aal Imran 3:37). Her father Imran had died, and the question of who would raise this consecrated child was one that the scholars of the sanctuary disputed among themselves. Each wished for the honour. The Quran alludes to how it was decided: 'And you were not with them when they cast their pens as to which of them should be responsible for Maryam' (Aal Imran 3:44). The commentators relate that they threw their pens, the reeds with which they wrote the Tawrah, into the river Jordan, agreeing that whoever's pen stood still or floated against the current would take her. Zakariya's pen alone was not carried away. The details are from the commentators; the Quran establishes the casting of lots and the result.

There was a fitness in this. Zakariya was a prophet, the husband of Maryam's aunt (or sister), and a man of the sanctuary. He made for Maryam a mihrab, a private chamber in the sanctuary, where she lived and worshipped, and he alone entered upon her. The Quran then describes what he found there: 'Every time Zakariya entered upon her in the prayer chamber, he found with her provision. He said: O Maryam, from where is this for you? She said: It is from Allah. Indeed, Allah provides for whom He wills without account' (Aal Imran 3:37).

The commentators, following Mujahid, Ikrimah and others, say that he found with her the fruits of summer in winter and the fruits of winter in summer. The Quran says only 'provision,' rizq, but the question of Zakariya, 'from where is this?', shows that it was something he had not brought and could not explain. He was her guardian; he knew what he provided. What he found in her chamber came from elsewhere.

Maryam's answer is a single sentence of tawhid, spoken by a child: 'It is from Allah. Indeed, Allah provides for whom He wills without account.' She did not credit an unseen visitor or claim any power of her own. She named the source and stated the principle. And the old prophet, hearing the young girl, understood something he had perhaps known all his life but had not applied to his own case.

The guardianship of Maryam was itself an honour, and the Quran names it as part of Allah's acceptance of her. But in the economy of the story, it was also Allah's way of bringing Zakariya to the door of his own miracle. He had been given charge of a child who was not his; in her chamber he saw that the laws of the seasons bent to the will of Allah; and from that chamber he would turn to his Lord and ask for a child of his own.

'At that, Zakariya called upon his Lord, saying: My Lord, grant me from Yourself a good offspring. Indeed, You are the Hearer of supplication' (Aal Imran 3:38). The word 'at that,' hunalika, links his prayer directly to what he had just seen. If Allah could provide summer fruit in winter for Maryam, He could provide a son in old age for her guardian. The miracle in her chamber became the ground of his hope.

Surah Maryam narrates the same prayer at greater length and adds a detail about its manner: 'A mention of the mercy of your Lord to His servant Zakariya, when he called to his Lord a private supplication' (Maryam 19:2-3). He called nida'an khafiyya, a hidden call, a supplication made in secret. The commentators explain that he prayed alone, in the night, in a low voice, so that no one heard him but Allah. Some say he did so because he was ashamed to be heard asking for a child at his age; others that secrecy is closer to sincerity; and Allah commands, 'Call upon your Lord in humility and privately' (Al-A'raf 7:55). Whatever the reason, the Quran opens the story of Zakariya by calling it 'the mercy of your Lord,' and that mercy began in secret.

The prayer itself, as Surah Maryam records it, is a model of how to ask. He begins with his weakness: 'My Lord, indeed my bones have weakened, and my head has filled with white.' He does not hide his age or pretend that the request is reasonable by worldly measure. Then he mentions Allah's past kindness: 'and never have I been in my supplication to You, my Lord, unhappy.' He has asked before and been answered before; he has never been turned away disappointed. This is tawassul, approaching Allah through His own previous favours. Then he states his fear: 'And indeed, I fear the successors after me, and my wife has been barren.' Finally he asks: 'So give me from Yourself an heir, who will inherit me and inherit from the family of Yaqub. And make him, my Lord, pleasing' (Maryam 19:4-6).

The inheritance he asked for was not wealth. The Prophet ﷺ said: 'We prophets do not leave inheritance; whatever we leave is charity' (Sahih al-Bukhari 3093; Sahih Muslim 1757), and Zakariya, a carpenter, had little to leave. What he wanted inherited was prophethood and knowledge, the trust of the 'family of Yaqub,' the line of revelation running from Ibrahim through Ishaq and Yaqub to the prophets of the Children of Israel. He feared that if it passed to his unworthy kinsmen it would be lost. And he asked that the son be 'pleasing,' radiyya, pleasing to Allah and pleasing to people, in religion and in character.

Surah Al-Anbiya records the shortest form of the prayer: 'And Zakariya, when he called to his Lord: My Lord, do not leave me alone, while You are the best of inheritors' (Al-Anbiya 21:89). Even in asking for an heir, he acknowledged that Allah Himself is the best inheritor; that whatever happens to his line, the earth and all upon it will return to Allah. He asked for a son not because he doubted that Allah would preserve His religion but because he longed to have a share in its preservation.

Every believer who prays for a child, for a cure, for relief, or for anything that seems beyond reach can take this prayer as a pattern: confess weakness, remember past favours, explain the need with honesty, ask for what is good, and leave the outcome with the best of inheritors. The Quran's verdict on it is given in the next verse: Allah answered.

The answer came while Zakariya was standing in prayer. 'So the angels called him while he was standing in prayer in the chamber: Indeed, Allah gives you good tidings of Yahya, confirming a word from Allah, and he will be a leader, chaste, and a prophet from among the righteous' (Aal Imran 3:39). He had prayed in secret; he was answered in the place of worship. The answer did not come by a dream or an inner feeling but by the call of angels, and it named the child before he was conceived.

Surah Maryam records Allah's words directly: 'O Zakariya, indeed We give you good tidings of a boy whose name will be Yahya. We have not assigned to any before this name' (Maryam 19:7). The name Yahya means 'he lives,' and the commentators note its fitness: a child given life from a barren womb and an old man, who would bring life to hearts through his preaching, and who would, as the Prophet ﷺ told, be killed for the truth and live in honour with his Lord. No one before him had been called by that name; Allah Himself chose it.

The description of the child in Surah Aal Imran is itself a prophecy. He would be 'confirming a word from Allah,' which the commentators, following Ibn Abbas, explain as confirming Isa son of Maryam, whom Allah calls 'His word' (An-Nisa 4:171), because Isa was created by the word 'Be.' Yahya would be the first to believe in Isa and to bear witness to him. He would be 'a leader,' sayyid, noble in knowledge and worship; 'chaste,' hasur, restraining himself from desires; and 'a prophet from among the righteous.' Before Yahya was born, his whole life had been described.

Zakariya's response was wonder, not doubt. 'He said: My Lord, how will I have a boy when I have reached old age and my wife is barren?' (Aal Imran 3:40). In Surah Maryam: 'My Lord, how will I have a boy when my wife has been barren and I have reached extreme old age?' (Maryam 19:8). The scholars explain that he was not questioning Allah's power, for he himself had asked for the child; he was asking how it would happen, whether he and his wife would be restored to youth or whether it would come in their present state, and expressing the astonishment of a man whose prayer had been answered beyond his expectation.

The reply was the answer to every such question: 'Such is Allah; He does what He wills' (Aal Imran 3:40). And in Surah Maryam, more fully: 'Thus it will be; your Lord says: It is easy for Me, for I created you before, while you were nothing' (Maryam 19:9). The argument is complete in one sentence. The One who created Zakariya from nothing could give him a son from a barren wife; the second is easier than the first, if anything is easier than anything for Allah.

Surah Al-Anbiya adds the means by which it came about: 'So We responded to him, and We gave to him Yahya, and amended for him his wife' (Al-Anbiya 21:90). Allah 'amended' his wife, made her fit to bear a child after a lifetime of barrenness. The commentators say this means He restored her capacity to conceive, and some add that He improved her character as well; the first meaning is the one most suited to the context. The impossible was made possible not by suspending the ordinary means but by repairing them.

The same verse gives the reason: 'Indeed, they used to hasten to good deeds and supplicate Us in hope and fear, and they were to Us humbly submissive' (Al-Anbiya 21:90). The gift was not arbitrary. Zakariya and his household had spent their lives racing to good, praying in hope and in fear, humble before their Lord. The son was the answer to a lifetime of such prayer.

Overwhelmed by the news, Zakariya asked for a sign: something by which he would know that the promise had begun to be fulfilled. 'He said: My Lord, make for me a sign. He said: Your sign is that you will not speak to the people for three days except by gesture. And remember your Lord much and exalt Him in the evening and the morning' (Aal Imran 3:41). Surah Maryam gives the same sign with a detail: 'Your sign is that you will not speak to the people for three nights, being sound' (Maryam 19:10).

The word 'being sound,' sawiyya, is important. His silence would not be the result of illness or injury. He would be in full health, his tongue unharmed, and yet unable to address people. The commentators note that the sign was perfectly suited to the miracle it announced. A man who had asked to be given a son against the ordinary course of nature would find his own tongue held against the ordinary course of nature. The sign showed him that the power which could stop his speech while he was well could create a son while he was old.

The sign was also a gift of worship. Though he could not speak to people, he was not silenced before Allah: 'And remember your Lord much and exalt Him in the evening and the morning.' His tongue was free for dhikr and tasbih and bound only for ordinary conversation. For three days, the old prophet was given a retreat of pure remembrance, in which every word he spoke was addressed to his Lord. The commentators say that this was a form of gratitude assigned to him: having received the greatest gift of his life, he was given three days in which to do nothing but thank the Giver.

Surah Maryam shows how he used the time. 'So he came out to his people from the prayer chamber and signalled to them to exalt Allah in the morning and the evening' (Maryam 19:11). He could not preach with words, so he preached with gestures. His first act after the good news was not to announce it, not to celebrate, but to call his people to glorify Allah. The scholars draw from this that the remembrance of Allah is the proper response to a blessing, and that a caller to Allah does not cease calling even when he cannot speak.

The scene has a quiet beauty. An old man walks out of the sanctuary, unable to speak, his face carrying a news that no one yet knows, and he lifts his hands to signal to the people: glorify your Lord, morning and evening. Some of them perhaps understood that something had happened to him; none could have guessed what. In time they would see his wife, barren for decades, carrying a child, and they would understand.

There is a connection here with the story of Maryam that the Quran draws in the very next passage of the same surah. When Maryam gave birth to Isa and returned to her people, she too was commanded to be silent: 'Indeed, I have vowed to the Most Merciful abstention, so I will not speak today to any man' (Maryam 19:26). Both miracles of birth, the son of the old man and the son of the virgin, were marked by a vow of silence. In each case the silence let the miracle speak for itself. Zakariya's silence was the sign of a promise; Maryam's was the defence of its fulfilment, as her newborn son spoke from the cradle on her behalf.

Yahya was born, and he grew into everything the angels had promised. The Quran describes him in the verses that follow the story of his father: 'O Yahya, take the Scripture with determination. And We gave him judgement while yet a boy, and affection from Us and purity, and he was fearing of Allah, and dutiful to his parents, and he was not a disobedient tyrant. And peace be upon him the day he was born and the day he dies and the day he is raised alive' (Maryam 19:12-15). The son whom Zakariya had asked to be 'pleasing' was, in the words of Allah, dutiful to his parents. The old man lived to see his prayer answered in full.

The Quran does not narrate the death of Zakariya. The Prophet ﷺ did not, in any sound hadith, describe it. The historians preserve conflicting reports. One widely told account, mentioned by Ibn Kathir from Wahb ibn Munabbih and others, says that when the Children of Israel sought to kill him, he fled and a tree opened for him and closed around him, and that Satan showed them the hem of his garment so that they sawed the tree in two with him inside it. Another report says that he died a natural death. Ibn Kathir records both and notes that the story of the tree is from the Isra'iliyyat; the scholars say it is not established, and some say it was originally told of another prophet, Shaya (Isaiah), and later transferred to Zakariya. It is mentioned here only so that the reader knows it is not a fact of Islam.

What is established is that the Children of Israel killed prophets. The Quran says so repeatedly: 'That was because they disbelieved in the signs of Allah and killed the prophets without right' (Al-Baqarah 2:61; Aal Imran 3:112). Yahya himself was killed, as the historians and many commentators record, on the order of a ruler whose unlawful marriage he had condemned. Whether Zakariya died by violence or in his bed, he lived in an age when telling the truth to the powerful was a mortal danger, and he and his son both told it.

Zakariya's honour in the Quran is secure. He is named among the righteous (Al-Anam 6:85); his story opens Surah Maryam, which Allah calls 'a mention of the mercy of your Lord to His servant Zakariya' (Maryam 19:2); he is held up in Surah Al-Anbiya with his family as people who 'used to hasten to good deeds and supplicate Us in hope and fear' (Al-Anbiya 21:90). The Prophet ﷺ mentioned his trade with respect (Sahih Muslim 2379), and in the night of the Miraj met his son and his son's cousin together in the second heaven (Sahih al-Bukhari 3887).

His legacy is above all a prayer. Muslims who long for children recite his words: 'My Lord, grant me from Yourself a good offspring. Indeed, You are the Hearer of supplication' (Aal Imran 3:38), and 'My Lord, do not leave me alone, while You are the best of inheritors' (Al-Anbiya 21:89). Those who have despaired of anything recall that Zakariya was old, his wife was barren, his bones were weak and his hair was white, and that Allah said: 'It is easy for Me.' And everyone who reads the story remembers the place where his hope was born: in the chamber of a young girl, when he saw the provision that Allah had sent her and heard her say, 'Indeed, Allah provides for whom He wills without account.'

The story of Zakariya is placed by the Quran at the threshold of the story of Isa. It prepares the reader for the greater miracle by showing a lesser one: if Allah can give a son to an old man and a barren woman, He can give a son to a virgin. Zakariya's question, 'How will I have a boy?', is echoed by Maryam's, 'How can I have a boy while no man has touched me?' (Maryam 19:20), and the answer to both is the same: 'It is easy for Me.' Zakariya stands at the end of the long line of the prophets of the Children of Israel, the guardian of the mother of their last prophet and the father of his herald, and his whole life is a witness that Allah's mercy arrives in its own time, and that it is never too late to ask.