Prophet Yahyaيحيى

Come with me. Today, we're going on a journey... far, far away... and long, long ago.

Picture a boy.

Not a grown-up. Not a wise old man with a white beard. A boy, a child, maybe about the age you are right now.

He is standing in a quiet room, and somebody is handing him something. Something heavy. Something enormous.

They are handing him a whole Book from Allah.

And a voice says to him, gently, but seriously, the way you speak to someone when what you are saying really matters:

"O Yahya... take the Book... with strength."

Take it seriously. Hold it tightly. Do not let go.

And the boy... takes it.

This is the story of Prophet Yahya... alayhi salaam. The boy who was given wisdom while he was still a child.

Do you remember the old man who whispered?

There was once a prophet named Zakariya, alayhi salaam. He was very, very old. His bones had grown weak and his hair had gone completely white. And for his whole long life... he had no children at all.

So one day, alone in a quiet place of worship, he whispered a secret prayer. He asked Allah for a child. Not just any child, a child who would be *pleasing to Allah*. Someone to carry the message after him.

And Allah, who hears every whisper, answered him.

"O Zakariya! We give you good news of a boy... whose name will be Yahya."

And Allah said something wonderful about that name. He said: *We have not given this name to anyone before him.*

Nobody in the whole history of the world had ever been called Yahya. Not one person. Allah made a brand-new name... just for this child.

So think about how much this boy was wanted. He was prayed for by an old man who had almost run out of hope. He was promised by Allah Himself. He was given a name nobody had ever carried.

He was waited for... for a very, very long time.

And then Yahya was born. And he grew.

Now here is the part that makes Yahya so different from almost anyone else in all the stories.

Most of the time, when Allah gives someone a great task, they are a grown-up. They have lived a long life. They have learned a lot. They are ready.

But the Qur'an says about Yahya: *"And We gave him wisdom while he was still a child."*

While he was still a child.

Not later. Not when he was older. Not once he had grown up and grown a beard and become a serious sort of person.

Right then. As a boy.

Allah gave him understanding. Real understanding, the kind that helps you know what is right and choose it, even when it is hard, even when nobody is watching, even when the other children are doing something else.

And Allah handed him the Book and told him: *take it with strength.*

Which means Yahya, as a child, decided something. He decided that what Allah said was not something to hold loosely, like a toy you might put down and forget. It was something to hold on to tightly. With both hands.

Now, if I told you Allah had given a boy wisdom and a Book... you might imagine somebody very stern. Somebody who frowned a lot. Somebody a bit frightening.

Yahya was not like that at all.

Listen to how Allah describes him in the Qur'an. Four things. Listen carefully, because each one is a treasure.

The first: Allah gave him *tenderness*. Softness. A gentle, kind heart, the sort of heart that notices when somebody is sad. The sort of heart that is careful with small creatures, and careful with people's feelings.

The second: Allah made him *pure*. Clean on the inside. His heart had no meanness in it. No jealousy hiding in the corners. No little cruelties.

The third: he was *careful of Allah*. He knew Allah was watching, always, and it made him gentle rather than frightened. He did not want to do anything that would upset the One who loved him.

And the fourth, and oh, this one is so beautiful,

Allah says: *"And he was dutiful to his parents... and he was never a harsh, disobedient tyrant."*

He was good to his mother and his father.

Think about that for a moment. Out of everything Allah could have said about this remarkable boy, a boy given wisdom, a boy given a Book, a boy with a brand-new name, one of the four things Allah chose to mention... is that he was kind to his parents.

He listened to them. He was gentle with them. He never spoke to them in that sharp voice we sometimes use when we are tired and we do not want to do the thing we have been asked to do.

Being good to your mum and your dad is such a big deal... that Allah put it in the Qur'an, forever, in the middle of describing one of His prophets.

As Yahya grew, Allah made him a prophet, just as He had promised his father.

And Yahya had a very special job.

In that same blessed land, another baby was going to be born, a baby whose birth would be a great wonder. A baby who would speak in the cradle. That baby was Isa, alayhi salaam, the son of Maryam.

And Allah tells us in the Qur'an that Yahya came *confirming a word from Allah*, meaning he came to tell the people the truth about Isa. To point to him. To say: *this is real, this is from Allah, believe it.*

Allah describes Yahya in that same verse with three more words. He calls him *noble*. He calls him *pure and self-restrained*. And He calls him *a prophet from among the righteous*.

So Yahya spent his life doing the bravest thing a person can do.

He told the truth.

Even when it was not the easy thing to say. Even when powerful people did not want to hear it. He said what was true, because Allah had told him to take the Book with strength, and he had said yes as a boy, and he never let go.

And when Yahya's life in this world came to an end, Allah said something about him that He has said about almost no one else.

Allah greeted him.

*"And peace be upon him the day he was born... and the day he dies... and the day he is raised up alive."*

Peace on all three days. The day he arrived. The day he left. And the day, one day, when everyone will be raised again.

Allah Himself said peace be upon Yahya. What a thing to be given.

That is the story of Prophet Yahya, alayhi salaam. The boy who was whispered for. The boy with a name nobody had ever carried. The boy who was given wisdom while he was still a child... and who held on to it with both hands.

And now... slowly... we leave that quiet room behind... the Book, the lamp, the boy holding on tightly... and we travel back home. To right here. Right now.

But carry Prophet Yahya with you, wherever you go. Because his story is a secret message just for you.

You do not have to wait until you are grown up to love Allah. You do not have to wait to be gentle, or honest, or kind to your mum and your dad. You do not have to wait to hold on tightly to what is true.

Allah gave wisdom to a child. He can put it in your heart too... starting tonight.

So let us end with the words Allah said to him. They mean... O Yahya, take the Book with strength. Say them with me... slowly... as if Allah were saying your name...

*Yā Yaḥyā... khudhi-l-kitāba bi-quwwah.*

Come with me. Today, we're going on a journey... far, far away... and long, long ago.

We're going to a small house at the edge of a blessed town... on the sort of evening when the sky has gone the colour of peaches... and everything smells like warm dust and cooking.

And here we are. Sit down for a moment. Feel how still it is.

This is the house of a very old man and a very old woman. Their names are Zakariya and his wife, and they have lived here for a long, long time.

And for all those years, this house has been quiet.

Not sad. Not unhappy. Just... quiet. No little feet running up the hallway. No small voice calling out at bedtime. No child.

But something has happened. Something enormous.

Because a few days ago, Prophet Zakariya, alayhi salaam, stood alone in the dark and whispered a prayer, the most private prayer of his whole life, and asked Allah for a child.

And Allah answered him. Straight away.

"O Zakariya! Indeed, We give you good news of a boy... whose name will be Yahya."

Now stop there. Because Allah did something in that sentence that He has hardly ever done for anybody.

Allah gave the child his name.

Not the mother. Not the father. Not a grandparent, or an uncle, or a family tradition passed down for generations.

Allah said: *his name will be Yahya.*

And then He said something even more amazing about it:

"We have not given this name to anyone before him."

Think about what that means for a second.

Every name you have ever heard belonged to somebody else first. Somebody had it before you. Somebody in your family, or in a story, or in a book.

But not this one.

In all the thousands and thousands of years since the very first human being... nobody had ever been called Yahya. Not one person. The name had been sitting there, unused, waiting.

And Allah kept it... for a boy who had not been born yet... to a father who had almost stopped hoping.

So think about how much this child was wanted.

He was prayed for, quietly, for years and years and years. He was promised by Allah Himself. He was given a name that had never touched anybody else's life.

He was waited for.

Here is what this moment whispers to us. You were waited for too.

Allah knew your name before anybody said it out loud. He knew you were coming. He chose exactly when you would arrive, and exactly which house you would arrive into, and exactly who would be there to hold you.

You are not an accident. Nobody is. Every single person is somebody Allah decided the world should have.

I wonder if you know what your own name means... and who chose it for you... and what they were hoping for when they did.

And now... softly... we step back from that quiet little house... out under the peach-coloured sky... and home. To right here. Right now.

And we can carry Allah's own words with us, the ones that made a brand-new name. They mean... O Zakariya, indeed We give you glad tidings of a boy whose name is Yahya. Say them slowly...

*Yā Zakariyyā... innā nubashshiruka bi-ghulāmin ismuhu Yaḥyā.*

Come with me. Today, we're going on a journey... far, far away... and long, long ago.

We're going to a small quiet room in a blessed land... in the middle of an ordinary afternoon... with sunlight coming in sideways through a high window.

And here we are. Look at the dust turning slowly in that beam of light. Listen, somewhere outside, a bird. Somewhere further off, a door. It is a completely normal day.

And in the middle of this room... there is a boy.

Not a grown-up. Not a wise old man with a long white beard and important robes.

A boy. A child. Maybe about the age you are right now.

His name is Yahya, alayhi salaam. And in a moment, something is going to happen to him that has happened to almost nobody else in all of history.

Because Allah is about to give him a whole Book.

And a voice says to him, gently, but seriously, the way somebody speaks when what they are saying really matters:

"O Yahya... take the Book... with strength."

*With strength.*

Not: have a look at this when you get a chance. Not: keep this somewhere safe. Not: read a bit of it if you feel like it.

*Take it with strength.* Hold it properly. Grip it. Take it seriously. Do not let go of it.

And here is the thing I want you to notice.

Allah did not wait.

He did not say: *when Yahya is older, when he is taller, when he has finished growing up, then We will give him the Book.*

Allah gave it to him right then. As a boy. With small hands.

And the Qur'an tells us something extraordinary in that very same verse. It says Allah gave him *wisdom while he was still a child*.

Wisdom. As a child.

Not just facts. Not just knowing things. Wisdom is the deeper thing, it is knowing what is *right*, and then actually choosing it. Even when it is hard. Even when nobody is watching. Even when everyone else your age is doing something different.

So picture that boy again, in the sunlight, with the Book in his hands.

And picture him deciding, right there, as a child, *I am going to hold on to this. Tightly. With both hands. For the rest of my life.*

And he did. He never let go. Not once.

Here is what this moment whispers to us. You do not have to wait until you are grown up to love Allah properly.

You do not have to wait to be honest. You do not have to wait to be kind. You do not have to wait to take Allah's words seriously and hold on to them with both hands.

Allah gave wisdom to a child. He can put it in your heart tonight, if you ask Him.

I wonder what one small good thing you could hold on to *with strength*... starting tomorrow morning.

And now... softly... we step back out of that sunlit room... away from the boy and the Book and the turning dust... and home. To right here. Right now.

And we can carry the words Allah said to him. They mean... O Yahya, take the Book with strength. Say them slowly... as if Allah were saying your own name...

*Yā Yaḥyā... khudhi-l-kitāba bi-quwwah.*

Come with me. Today, we're going on a journey... far, far away... and long, long ago.

We're going to a small house in a blessed land... at the end of an ordinary day... when the light has gone soft and orange and everything is winding down.

And here we are. Smell that? Bread. Somebody has been baking. Hear that? Somebody moving about slowly in the next room, tidying up.

In this house live an old man and an old woman, Prophet Zakariya, alayhi salaam, and his wife. They waited such a long time for a child.

And here he is. Their son. Yahya, alayhi salaam.

Now, Allah gave this boy some extraordinary things. He gave him a Book. He gave him wisdom while he was still a child. He made him a prophet.

So when Allah describes Yahya in the Qur'an, you might expect a list of enormous, impressive things.

Let me tell you what Allah actually said. There are four things. Listen carefully, because each one is a treasure.

The first: Allah gave him *tenderness*. Softness. A gentle heart, the kind that notices when somebody is sad. The kind that is careful with small creatures and careful with people's feelings.

The second: Allah made him *pure*. Clean on the inside. No meanness tucked away in the corners. No jealousy. No little cruelties that nobody else would ever see.

The third: he was *careful of Allah*. He knew Allah was watching, always, and it did not frighten him, it made him gentle. He simply did not want to do anything that would upset the One who loved him.

And the fourth.

Are you ready? Because out of everything Allah could have chosen to say about this remarkable boy...

Allah said: *"And he was dutiful to his parents... and he was never a harsh, disobedient tyrant."*

He was good to his mum and his dad.

That is it. That is one of the four.

Think about how big that is. A boy given a Book from the sky. A boy given wisdom before he was grown. A boy with a name nobody in history had ever carried.

And one of the four things Allah picked out to tell the whole world, forever, in the Qur'an... is that he was kind to his parents.

So picture him in this little house on this ordinary evening.

Fetching water for his mother without being asked twice.

Sitting with his very old father and listening properly, not half-listening while thinking about something else.

Never using that sharp voice we all use sometimes, when we are tired, and we have been asked to do the thing we did not want to do.

Nothing dramatic. Nothing anybody would write a song about. Just a boy being gentle with the two people who waited for him longest.

And Allah put it in the Qur'an.

Here is what this moment whispers to us. The things that make you great in Allah's eyes are often small, and quiet, and happen at home where nobody claps.

How you speak to your mum when you are tired. Whether you come the first time you are called. Whether you say thank you for the food.

Allah is watching all of it. And He thinks it is important enough to write down.

I wonder what one gentle thing you could do tomorrow... for the people who waited for you.

And now... softly... we step back out of that warm little house... past the smell of bread... into the orange evening... and home. To right here. Right now.

And we can carry Allah's own words about Yahya with us. They mean... and he was dutiful to his parents. Say them slowly...

*Wa barran bi-wālidayh.*

Come with me. Today, we're going on a journey... far, far away... and long, long ago.

We're going out to the edge of a blessed land... to a wide open place under an enormous sky... just as the stars are coming out.

And here we are. Look up. Can you see how many there are? Feel the air cooling on your face. Somewhere far off, water is moving.

We have come out here because I want to tell you about something Allah said. And it is so beautiful that it deserves a big sky.

You remember Yahya, alayhi salaam? The boy who was whispered for. The boy with a name nobody had ever carried. The boy Allah gave wisdom to while he was still a child, and handed a whole Book, and told: *take it with strength*.

He grew up. And he kept his promise. He never let go of that Book, not for a single day of his life.

He grew up gentle, and honest, and pure. Allah calls him *noble* in the Qur'an. Allah calls him someone who held himself back from anything wrong. Allah calls him *a prophet from among the righteous*.

And he had a special job, too. In that same land, a baby was going to be born who would be a great wonder, a baby who spoke in the cradle. That was Isa, alayhi salaam, the son of Maryam.

And Yahya came to tell the people the truth about him. To point, and to say: *this is real. This is from Allah. Believe it.*

Telling the truth was what Yahya did. Even when it was not the easy thing to say. Even when powerful people did not want to hear it. He had taken the Book with strength as a boy... and he never loosened his grip.

Now here is the thing I brought you out under the stars to hear.

When Allah finished describing Yahya in the Qur'an... He greeted him.

Allah Himself. Said peace. Over him.

Listen:

"And peace be upon him the day he was born..."

"...and the day he dies..."

"...and the day he is raised up alive."

Three days. Not one. All three of the days that ever really matter to anybody.

The day you arrive in this world. The day you leave it. And the day, one day, when every single person who ever lived will stand up again.

Peace on all three.

Do you understand what that means? It means Yahya was safe. Completely, entirely safe, at the beginning, at the end, and afterwards. Nothing frightening could touch him on any of those days, because Allah had already said the word *peace* over each one.

And Allah said it out loud, in a Book that would be read for thousands of years, so that everybody would know.

Here is what this moment whispers to us. The very best thing that can ever happen to a person is that Allah is pleased with them.

Not being famous. Not being rich. Not being the strongest or the cleverest or the one everybody talks about.

Just this: that Allah says peace over you.

And Yahya earned it as a boy, by being gentle, and truthful, and kind to his mum and dad, and holding on tightly to what Allah told him.

All of which you can start doing tonight.

I wonder what Allah sees when He looks at your day today... and what small thing you could add to it tomorrow.

And now... softly... we walk back in from under that enormous sky... with the stars still out behind us... and home. To right here. Right now.

And we can carry Allah's own greeting to Yahya with us. It means... and peace be upon him the day he was born, and the day he dies, and the day he is raised alive. Say it slowly...

*Wa salāmun ʿalayhi yawma wulida... wa yawma yamūtu... wa yawma yubʿathu ḥayyā.*