Job · Ayyub

Job in Islam

Job is Ayyub in Arabic, written أَيُّوب. The two names belong to the same person, and the two traditions tell his story differently enough to be worth reading side by side.

English: Job
Arabic: أَيُّوب
Read as: Ayyub
Status: Prophet in Islam
Where the English comes from: Hebrew Iyyov, of disputed meaning; persecuted and one who returns have both been argued.
What the Arabic carries: Ayyub, the Quranic form; the name Islamic tradition attaches to patience.
Full name page: Ayyub on AsrNaam

Is Job the same as Ayyub? Yes. Job is the English form and Ayyub the Arabic form of one name. His name became the Arabic and Urdu shorthand for patience: sabr-e-Ayyub.

Ayyub in the Quran

Ayyub is the shorthand for patience in Arabic and Urdu. Sabr-e-Ayyub, the patience of Job, is a phrase people use without thinking about where it came from. The Quran gives the story briefly and twice, in Surah Al-Anbiya and Surah Sad, and both times it moves quickly to the relief rather than dwelling on the affliction.

What he says is short. He calls on God and says that harm has touched him, and that God is the most merciful of the merciful. There is no argument and no demand, which is the difference between the Quranic Ayyub and the Job of the Hebrew Bible, whose long dispute with his friends occupies most of that book.

He is told to strike the ground with his foot, and a spring comes up, cool to wash in and to drink. His family is returned to him and the like of them with them. The Quran calls him an excellent servant, one who turned back.

Using the name

The full entry for Ayyub carries the Arabic spelling, the Urdu, the pronunciation, the lucky number and the letter-by-letter Ilm ul Huroof reading, along with every romanisation the name is written in.

Open the full Ayyub page →

Questions about Job and Ayyub

Is Job the same name as Ayyub?

Job is the English form and Ayyub is the Arabic form of the same name. They refer to the same figure.

Is Ayyub the same as Job?

Yes. Ayyub is the Arabic form of the Hebrew Iyyov, the prophet tested by loss and illness.

Why is Ayyub associated with patience?

Because the Quran calls him an excellent servant who kept turning back to God under affliction, and the phrase sabr-e-Ayyub entered ordinary speech from there.

Can a Muslim family use the name Ayyub?

Yes. Ayyub is used as a given name across the Muslim world. AsrNaam carries its full page with the Arabic spelling, the pronunciation, the lucky number and the letter-by-letter Ilm ul Huroof reading.

Other names the two traditions share

Every one of these is one figure under two names.

Jesus and Isa Moses and Musa Mary and Maryam Abraham and Ibrahim Joseph and Yusuf David and Dawud Solomon and Sulayman Noah and Nuh John and Yahya Jacob and Yaqub Jonah and Yunus Aaron and Harun Isaac and Ishaq Ishmael and Ismail

Or start from the full list of Biblical names in Islam.