What Does Muslim Mean? Surrender, Peace and the Meaning of Tasleem

What does Muslim mean? A Muslim is one who submits to Allah. The word comes from the Arabic verb aslama, to submit, and its root s-l-m also gives salam (peace) and salamah (soundness). The Qur'an praises "whoever submits his face [i.e., self] in Islām to Allāh while being a doer of good" (Qur'an 2:112).

A man walks into the gathering dressed in pure white clothes, his hair extraordinarily black. There are no signs of travel on him, and none of the Companions recognise him. He kneels before the Prophet ﷺ, places his palms on his thighs, and asks his first question: "Muhammad, inform me about al-Islam."

Umar ibn al-Khattab was in that room, and his son Abdullah later passed the story on. Of everything a stranger could ask about this religion, the first question was about its name. After he left, the Prophet ﷺ told Umar who he was: "He was Gabriel (the angel). He came to you in order to instruct you in matters of religion" (Umar ibn al-Khattab, Sahih Muslim 8a).

Muslim means one who submits, and in the Qur'an it means one who submits to Allah. Islam is the verbal noun, the act of submitting, and a Muslim is the person doing it. The clearest picture in the Qur'an is Ibrahim (Abraham), whose whole answer is one sentence:

In Arabic the command is aslim and the answer is aslamtu: the same verb, given back. The next verse says Ibrahim passed the word to his sons: "do not die except while you are Muslims" (Qur'an 2:132).

The word describes something a person does, and keeps doing, every day of a life.

Islam means submission to Allah, and peace is part of its family of meanings without being its translation. The three root letters s-l-m carry a cluster of ideas: safety, soundness, wholeness and peace. As-Salam is one of the names of Allah, which Saheeh International renders as "the Perfection" (Qur'an 59:23).

The Prophet ﷺ himself played on the root when he described a Muslim:

In the Arabic, a Muslim is the one from whose tongue and hand the Muslims are salima: safe. The submission is to Allah, and the people around us are meant to feel it as safety. That's the fair version of "Islam means peace": submission comes first, and peace follows from it.

Islam is the outward practice of submission and iman (faith) is the inward belief, and the Hadith of Jibril separates them in one sitting. When the stranger asked about Islam, the Prophet ﷺ answered:

Iman, in the same hadith, is to affirm faith in Allah, His angels, His Books, His messengers, the Last Day and the Divine Decree about good and evil. A third level, ihsan, is to worship Allah as if we see Him.

The Qur'an marks the gap too. Some Bedouins said they had believed, and were told: "say [instead], 'We have submitted,' for faith has not yet entered your hearts" (Qur'an 49:14). The same verse ends by calling Allah Forgiving and Merciful. So a person can begin with submission while the heart is still catching up.

Tasleem in Islam is full and willing surrender, the heart's yes after the body has already said it. The word appears in the Qur'an describing believers who bring their disputes to the Prophet ﷺ and then "find within themselves no discomfort from what you have judged and submit in [full, willing] submission" (Qur'an 4:65). The Arabic ends wa yusallimu tasleema.

That verse is about accepting the Prophet's ﷺ judgement. Scholars also use the word more widely for how a believer meets what Allah decrees. The Prophet ﷺ said there is good in every affair of a believer: in delight he gives thanks, in trouble he endures patiently, and both are good for him (Suhaib, Sahih Muslim 2999). Both responses grow from the same acceptance.

No, surrender to Allah does not mean giving up, and the Sunnah draws the line clearly. In the same hadith that teaches what to say after a loss, the Prophet ﷺ first tells us to strive:

In the hadith, effort and asking for help come first, and when something happens anyway, tasleem closes the door on the "if only".

Two more hadith keep surrender from turning passive. When people asked whether to use medical treatment, he said, "Make use of medical treatment, for Allah has not made a disease without appointing a remedy for it" (Usamah ibn Sharik, Sunan Abi Dawud 3855). We've written more about this in seeking treatment in Islam. And on wrongdoing he said, "He who amongst you sees something abominable should modify it with the help of his hand," and failing that with the tongue, and failing that with the heart (Abu Sa'id al-Khudri, Sahih Muslim 49a).

So tasleem never asks anyone to accept harm or injustice quietly. Someone living with abuse deserves real help and safety, and a qualified scholar can guide a particular situation. What tasleem releases is the claim that every outcome was ours to guarantee. The camel still gets tied, as our piece on tawakkul and tying the camel explores.

Research offers a modest echo. A meta-analysis of 49 studies found positive forms of religious coping linked to better adjustment to stress, and negative forms to worse.¹ The studies show an association, which falls short of proving cause, and the review did not look at tasleem itself.

Radeetu billahi rabba means "I am pleased with Allah as my Lord", and it's a sentence the Prophet ﷺ taught for the moment the adhan is heard. The full wording in Sahih Muslim is:

The Arabic of the second half is: radeetu billahi rabban, wa bi Muhammadin rasulan, wa bil-islami deena. The hadith says that whoever says it on hearing the mu'adhdhin will have his sins forgiven.

A second hadith gives the same contentment a taste: "He has found the taste of faith (iman) who is content with Allah as his Lord, with Islam as his religion (code of life) and with Muhammad (ﷺ) as his Prophet" (Abbas ibn Abd al-Muttalib, Sahih Muslim 34). Rida, being pleased, is tasleem with the tightness gone out of it.

Tasleem in a hard moment can be practised in small steps, some taught directly in the hadith and some that are simply habits we find help. The first four come from the texts above:

None of this asks us to feel calm on command. When his infant son Ibrahim was dying, the Prophet ﷺ wept, and said:

Tears and tasleem sat in the same sentence. Our piece on the replay loop of overthinking looks at what the "if only" does to a mind at 2am.

The stranger in white asked about Islam first, and the answer was a list of things a person does. Tasleem is the inner side of that list: the quiet moment, maybe on a Friday afternoon with a week that didn't go to plan, when we stop arguing with what already happened and turn to what's still ours to do. Which outcome are we still trying to carry that was never ours to hold?