Hafsa bint ʿUmar, Mother of the Believers, married the Prophet ﷺ in the year 3 of the Hijra. The sheets of the Quran compiled under Abu Bakr were kept in her house, and ʿUthman later used them to have the copies sent to the provinces made (al-Bukhari 4987).
Hafsa is the feminine of hafs, a word the lexicographers explain as “lion cub” (ʿUmar ibn al-Khattab bore the kunya Abu Hafs). The name thus evokes the strength and liveliness of a young lioness. It is given throughout the Muslim world in memory of ʿUmar’s daughter, a Mother of the Believers.
In Arabic
حَفْصَةحفصة
Transliteration
Ḥafṣa
Root
ح ف ص
Gender
Girl
Origin
Arabic
Is Hafsa in the Quran?
No: neither the name Hafsa nor its root appears in the Quran. A name can be beautiful and permissible without coming from the Quran.
Ibn Shihāb reported from Anas ibn Mālik that he informed him that Hudhayfah ibn al-Yamān came to ‘Uthmān when he was preparing the people of the Levant and Iraq to conquer Armenia and Azerbaijan. Hudhayfah was alarmed by their difference in reading the Qur’an, so he said to ‘Uthmān: "O Commander of…
