Ubayy ibn Ka'b: The Companion Who Named the Greatest Verse

Three details are worth noticing before we even get to Ubayy’s life.

First, the Prophet ﷺ asked the question twice. The first time, Ubayy gave the polite answer of the companions: Allah and His Messenger know best. The question was repeated, which told him that the Prophet ﷺ wanted to hear his own understanding. Only then did he answer.

Second, the Prophet ﷺ used his kunyah, Abu al-Mundhir. Calling someone by their kunyah was a sign of warmth and respect.

Third, the reaction. A strike on the chest, an oath by Allah, and a prayer that knowledge be pleasant and easy for him. There are very few places in the Sunnah where a companion’s answer is celebrated like this.

Ubayy ibn Ka’b ibn Qays was from the Banu an-Najjar, a clan of the Khazraj in Madinah, the same clan as the Prophet’s ﷺ grandfather’s mother. He was one of the Ansar who accepted Islam early, before the Hijrah. He was present at the second pledge of ‘Aqabah, when the people of Madinah promised to protect the Prophet ﷺ, and he fought at Badr and in the battles after it.

Unusually for Madinah at that time, Ubayy could read and write. Before Islam he had studied the earlier scriptures, which gave him a feel for revelation that many others did not have. After the Prophet ﷺ arrived, he became one of the first people to write down the Quran as it was revealed.

The clearest sign of Ubayy’s rank is a scene in Sahih al-Bukhari that is almost hard to believe.

The surah is al-Bayyinah. Imagine being told that Allah, above the seven heavens, had mentioned you by name and instructed His Messenger to recite to you. Ubayy’s first reaction was disbelief, his second was tears. Scholars explain that the purpose was partly to teach: the Prophet ﷺ reciting to Ubayy so that Ubayy would carry the recitation exactly and pass it on.

When the Prophet ﷺ named the people from whom the Quran should be learned, Ubayy was among them:

In another narration the Prophet ﷺ described the strengths of several companions, and said: “the best reciter among them is Ubayy ibn Ka’b” (Sunan at-Tirmidhi 3791, graded sahih). ‘Umar ibn al-Khattab later echoed this, saying that Ubayy was the best of them in recitation. When ‘Umar gathered people to pray tarawih behind one imam in the masjid, the imam he chose was Ubayy (Sahih al-Bukhari 2010).

Ubayy was also among the companions who had collected the whole Quran in the Prophet’s ﷺ lifetime (Sahih al-Bukhari 5003).

Put those facts together and the conversation in Sahih Muslim makes sense. The Prophet ﷺ did not ask the question to a random group. He asked the one man who had written the Quran down, memorised it, studied scripture before Islam, and been named by Allah Himself. If anyone could weigh one verse against another by its meaning, it was Ubayy.

And his answer was not a guess. Ayatul Kursi stands out because every phrase in it is about Allah alone: His oneness, His life, His sustaining, His freedom from sleep, His ownership, His permission over intercession, His knowledge, His Kursi, His guarding and His greatness. Ubayy, who knew the whole Book, recognised that no other verse gathers so much about Allah in one place. We explain that reasoning in more detail in why Ayatul Kursi is the greatest verse.

Ubayy did not jump in with the answer. He first deferred to Allah and His Messenger. That is the manner of a student. Only when it was clear his own answer was wanted did he give it.

All of the Quran is the speech of Allah, and every letter carries reward. But the hadith shows that verses and surahs differ in their virtue. Ayatul Kursi is the greatest verse, al-Fatihah the greatest surah (Sahih al-Bukhari 4474), and al-Ikhlas equal to a third of the Quran (Sahih al-Bukhari 5013). Scholars explain that this difference comes from the subject matter: what speaks most directly about Allah carries the most weight.

The Prophet ﷺ did not just say “correct”. He touched Ubayy, swore by Allah and made du’a for him. Anyone who teaches the Quran, at home or in a class, can learn from that. A child who answers well should feel it.

The du’a li-yahnika al-‘ilm means “may knowledge be easy and pleasing for you”. It treats knowledge as something to enjoy, not a burden. That is a good way to approach learning Ayatul Kursi too, slowly, phrase by phrase, with the meaning in front of you. Our word-by-word page and practice tool are built for exactly that.

There is a second narration connected to Ubayy and Ayatul Kursi. In it, Ubayy noticed that dates were going missing from his store, waited at night, and met a creature like a young boy who turned out to be a jinn. Ubayy asked what protects people from them, and the jinn named Ayatul Kursi, saying that whoever recites it in the evening is protected from them until morning, and whoever recites it in the morning is protected until evening. When Ubayy told the Prophet ﷺ, he said: “The wicked one told the truth.”

This narration is recorded by al-Hakim, at-Tabarani and an-Nasa’i in al-Kubra. Al-Hakim graded it authentic, and al-Albani graded it sahih in Sahih at-Targhib. It closely resembles the story of Abu Hurayrah in Sahih al-Bukhari 2311, which we tell in full in Abu Hurayrah and the thief. Together, the two narrations are the basis for reciting Ayatul Kursi in the morning and evening adhkar as well as before sleep.

Ubayy taught the Quran in Madinah for years after the Prophet ﷺ. Among the people who learned from him were Ibn ‘Abbas, Abu Hurayrah and many of the next generation, and his recitation is one of the sources from which the established readings of the Quran were transmitted. Some of the companions’ explanations of verses that we read in the books of tafsir come from him.

Every time a Muslim says that Ayatul Kursi is the greatest verse of the Quran, they are repeating Ubayy’s answer, confirmed by the Prophet ﷺ with a hand on his chest. It is a good reason to remember his name.