to the servant’s supplication after that praise and grants him what he asks for. This special quality belongs to no other surah, and nothing comparable is authentically reported about any part of the Qur’an except the concluding verses of Sūrat al-Baqarah. They too are from the treasure beneath the Throne, and a supplication made with them is answered just as a supplication made with al-Fātiḥah is answered. Yet al-Fātiḥah surpasses them in two ways:

1. Praise opens al-Fātiḥah, whereas those verses contain no praise; they merely convey statements about faith, which al-Fātiḥah also contains.

2. The petition in al-Fātiḥah is the nobler one: the plea for guidance to the Straight Path, without which there is no salvation. The petition in those verses concerns matters that branch from and complete that guidance, and such matters cannot be obtained without first being guided to the Straight Path.

The fifth virtue: the surah gathers within it the purposes of all the scriptures sent down from heaven. Ibn Abī Ḥātim narrated with his chain from al-Ḥasan, who said: “Allah, exalted is He, sent down four hundred books and four major ones. He combined them in four books: the Torah, the Gospel, the Psalms, and the Qur’an. He then combined the four in the Qur’an, combined the Qur’an in the mufaṣṣal sections, combined the mufaṣṣal in al-Fātiḥah, and combined the knowledge of al-Fātiḥah in: ‘You alone we worship and You alone we ask for help.’”

Abū ʿUbayd also narrated in his Kitāb, with his chain, from al-Ḥasan from