Al-Fatihah (Arabic: الفَاتِحَة‎‎)

Verse	Text	Transliteration	Translation
1.1.	بِسْمِ ٱللَّهِ ٱلرَّحْمَٰنِ ٱلرَّحِيمِ	BismiALLAHi r-Raḥmāni r-Raḥīm	In the Name of ALLAH, the Beneficent, the Especially Merciful.
1.2.	ٱلْحَمْدُ لِلَّهِ رَبِّ الْعَالَمِينَ	Al ḥamdu LILLAi rabbi l-’ālamīn	[All] praise is [due] to GOD, LORD of the Worlds
1.3.	ٱلرَّحْمَٰنِ ٱلرَّحِيمِ	Ar Raḥmāni r-Raḥīm	The Beneficent, the Especially Merciful.
1.4.	مَالِكِ يَوْمِ ٱلدِّينِ	Māliki yawmi d-dīn	Sovereign of the Day of Recompense.
1.5.	إِيَّاكَ نَعْبُدُ وَإِيَّاكَ نَسْتَعِينُ	Iyyāka na’budu wa iyyāka nasta’īn	It is You we worship and You we ask for help.
1.6.	ٱهْدِنَا الصِّرَاطَ ٱلْمُسْتَقِيمَ	Ihdinā ṣ-ṣirāṭ al-Mustaqīm	Show us to the straight Path
1.7.	صِرَاطَ ٱلَّذِينَ أَنْعَمْتَ عَلَيْهِمْ غَيْرِ ٱلْمَغْضُوبِ عَلَيْهِمْ وَلَا ٱلضَّآلِّين	Ṣirāṭ al-laḏīna an’amta ‘alayhim ġayril maġḍūbi ‘alayhim walāḍ ḍāllīn	The Path of those whom Thou hast favoured. Not [the Path] of those who earn Thine anger nor of those who go astray. [Amin]
The word “Amin” [“Amen”, “Verily”] is not written in Quran, but is usually pronounced at the end of the prayer.
(Al-Fatiha)

 

Sūrat al-Fātiḥah (Arabic: سُّورَةُ الفَاتِحَة‎‎) is the first chapter (surah) of the Quran. Its seven verses (ayat) are a prayer for the guidance, lordship and mercy of GOD [ALLAH in Arabic]. This chapter has an essential role in Islamic prayer (salāt). The primary literal meaning of the expression “al-Fātiḥah” is “The Opener,” which could refer to this Surah being “the opener of the Book” (Fātiḥat al-kitāb), to its being the first Surah recited in full in every prayer cycle (rakʿah), or to the manner in which it serves as an opening for many functions in everyday Islamic life. Some Muslims interpret it as a reference to an implied ability of the Surah to open a person to faith in GOD.

Al-Fātiḥah is often believed to be a synthesis of the Quran. It in itself is a prayer at the very beginning of the Quran, which acts as a preface of the Quran and implies that the book is for a person who is a seeker of truth—a reader who is asking a deity who is the only one worthy of all praise (and is the creator, owner, sustainer of the worlds etc.) to guide him to a straight path. It can be said to “encapsulate all of the metaphysical and eschatological realities of which human beings must remain conscious.”