In the Name of God, Most Gracious, Most Merciful

The Word "Wahed"/One


The Quran is characterized by a unique phenomenon never found in any human authored book. Every element of the Quran is mathematically composed¾the suras, the verses, the words, the number of certain letters, the number of words from the same root, the number and variety of divine names, the unique spelling of certain words, and many other elements of the Quran besides its content. There are two major facets of the Quran’s mathematical system: (1) The mathematical literary composition, and (2) The mathematical structure involving the numbers of suras and verses.

The number nineteen is the common denominator throughout the Quran’s mathematical system. For example, the first verse (1:1), known as Bas-malah, consists of 19 Arabic letters. The Quran consists of 114 (19x6) su-ras. The total number of verses in the Quran (including the 112 un-numbered Basmalahs) is 6346 or 19x334. Also 6+3+4+6 = 19. The to-tal occurrence of the word Allah (God) is 2698, or 19x142. The total sum of the verse numbers for all verses containing the word Allah is 118123, or 19x6217. These are just a few examples and should alone suffice as incontrovertible proof that the Quran is God’s message to the world. However, the Quran’s mathematical system is not limited to the word Al-lah (God), it is extremely vast, ex-tremely intricate, and totally compre-hensive. For more information, please refer to Appendix 1 of the "Quran: The Final Testament, Authorized English Translation by Rashad Khalifa, Ph.D."

Why 19?

The "abjad" numerical system, as-signing a numerical value to each letter, has been widely practiced be-fore the establishment of the Roman or Arabic numerals as we know today. For example, in Arabic, the letter Alif (A) has a numerical value of 1, and Bah (B) has a numerical value of 2, and so on. If the people’s language were Hebrew, or Aramaic, they used the letters of that language for numer-als. We now understand that the mathematical coding of the Quran with the number 19 is based on the fact that 19 is the numerical value of the word "wahid" (ONE). The fol-lowing is a study done by Dr. Cesar Majul in 1984. It is reported again here as an answer to some people’s question on 19.

The Word "One" Referring to God

In the text of the Quran, there are 19 and only 19 verses where the word wahid ( ) is used to refer to or characterize Allah (God) as ONE.

It is to be recalled that the most im-portant or basic doctrine¾the central theme¾of the Quran is that God is ONE. The Quran teaches that God will forgive any sin of a repentant transgressor; but one offense He will not forgive is that of ascribing part-ners to Him (39:53; 4:48; 4:116 ...).


Applying the abjad numerical system (or gematrical values of the letters) to the word wahid gives it the numerical value of 19:

Arabic LettersNumerical Value

The word wahid occurs 25 times in the total number of Quranic verses. Of these, one verse refers to one kind of food. Two verses use the word to refer to persons involved in inheritance shares. One verse refers to a gate. One refers to watering, and another one refers to each of a pair of adulterers. These account for six verses. The bal-ance of 19 verses refer to God’s qual-ity (sifat) as being ONE. Table 1 lists all the verses in which the word wahid (ONE) is mentioned.

Thus there are 19 and only 19 Quranic verses which use the word wahid as exclusively referring to God’s Oneness. That this word also has the numerical value of 19 is significant. This fact in the light of other consid-erations, like the researches of Dr. Rashad Khalifa, cannot be another accident or coincidence. Indeed, it is another instance of general pattern in the Quran.

Note: Incidentally, the word wahidan ( ) is also found in the Quran to refer to "one." It as such occurs five times. In 25:14 it refers to one’s destruction. In 38:5 it refers to some persons trying to make many gods into one. In 54:24 it refers to one alone among men. In 2:133 and 9:31, it refers to worship of One God. But the numerical value of wahidan is twenty and not nineteen. This comes about from the extra alif used for the tanwin at the end of the word. Thus this word was not included in the list of 25 entries in Table 1.

[74:21-30] He looked. He frowned and whined. Then he turned away ar-rogantly. He said, "This is but clever magic! This is human made." I will commit him to retri-bution. What retribution! Thor-ough and comprehensive. Obvious to all people.

[74:30] Over it is nine-teen.


Dr. Cesar Majul


  1. Concordance of the Quran by Mu-hammad Fuad Abdul-Baqi
  2. Concordance of the Quran by Hanna Kassis.
    Table 1. The 25 verses in which the word wahid (one) is mentioned in the Quran, and the 19 cases where it refers to the oneness of God
    NumberSura and Versethe word wahid refers toVerses where wahid refers to God
    12:61one kind of food
    22:63God as ONE1
    34:11Inheritance/one person
    44:12Inheritance/each of two
    54:171God as ONE2
    65:73God as ONE3
    76:19God as ONE4
    812:39God as ONE5
    912:67one gate
    1113:16God as ONE6
    1214:48God as ONE7
    1314:52God as ONE8
    1416:22God as ONE9
    1516:51God as ONE10
    1618:110God as ONE11
    1721:108God as ONE12
    1822:34God as ONE13
    1924:2each adulterer
    2029:46God as ONE14
    2137:4God as ONE15
    2238:65God as ONE16
    2339:4God as ONE17
    2440:16God as ONE18
    2541:6God as ONE19