Ibrāhīm ibn Hāshim related to us; Saʿīd ibn Zanbūr (1) related to us; Salīm Abū Muslim (2), from al-Ḥasan ibn Dīnār, from Yazīd al-Rishk, who said: I heard Abū Zayd—he was one of the Companions—say, “I was with the Prophet ﷺ in one of the ravines of Medina at night. He heard a man engaged in the night vigil reciting Umm al-Qurʾān (the Opening Surah). The Prophet stopped and listened to him until he finished it, then said, ‘There is nothing in the Quran comparable to it.’”

Al-Ṭabarānī also recorded this report in al-Awsat through the chain of Ibrāhīm ibn Hāshim, adding, “This ḥadīth is not narrated from Abū Zayd ʿAmr ibn Akhtab except by this chain; Salīm ibn Muslim is its sole transmitter.” (3)

These reports state plainly that al-Fātiḥah is the most excellent of all the surahs in the Quran.

Scholars have differed over whether one portion of the Quran can be deemed superior to another. Some denied this outright, arguing that the entire Quran is the speech of Allah—one of His attributes—so no part of it may be described as better than any other. A similar view is related from Mālik (4), and it is