The Four Sacred Months in Islam: Names and Meaning

The four sacred months (in Arabic al-ashhur al-hurum) are Dhu al-Qi'dah, Dhu al-Hijjah, Muharram and Rajab: the 11th, 12th, 1st and 7th months of the Hijri calendar. The Quran says that four of the twelve months are sacred, and a sahih hadith of the Prophet ﷺ names them. Three run back to back, from Dhu al-Qi'dah through Muharram, and Rajab stands alone in the middle of the year. By the calculated Umm al-Qura calendar, the next sacred month is Rajab 1448, which begins on Thursday 10 December 2026.

Key Takeaways

• Quran 9:36 says the year has twelve months and that four of them are sacred.
• In Sahih al-Bukhari 3197, the Prophet ﷺ names them: Dhu al-Qi'dah, Dhu al-Hijjah and Muharram in a row, and Rajab between Jumada al-Thani and Sha'ban.
• The same verse tells believers "do not wrong yourselves during them"; commentators such as Qatadah explained that wrongdoing in these months is graver.
• Fighting in the sacred months was forbidden in Arabia before Islam, and the Quran calls fighting in them a grave matter (2:217).
• Calculated dates: Rajab 1448 runs 10 December 2026 to 8 January 2027; the three consecutive months run 8 April to 4 July 2027.

What the Quran says in 9:36

The sacred months are set out in Surah at-Tawbah 9:36. In the Sahih International translation of the meaning on quran.com, the verse says that the number of months with Allah is twelve "in the register of Allāh [from] the day He created the heavens and the earth; of these, four are sacred." It continues: "That is the correct religion [i.e., way], so do not wrong yourselves during them."

Three points come straight from the verse:

• The year is twelve months. The Hijri year is fixed at twelve lunar months, with no extra month added to keep pace with the seasons.
• Four of them are sacred. The verse gives the number but does not list the names. The names come from the hadith.
• The instruction is moral, not only legal. "Do not wrong yourselves" during them is a call to guard one's conduct in those months.

The next verse, 9:37, condemns the pre-Islamic practice of nasi', in which the sanctity of a month was moved from one year to another. In the Sahih International rendering, those who did it made a month "lawful one year and unlawful another year to correspond to the number made unlawful by Allāh." The sister post on nasi and the end of the leap month explains that practice and why the Islamic calendar has no intercalary month.

The hadith that names the four months

The Prophet ﷺ named the four months in a sermon narrated by Abu Bakra. In Sahih al-Bukhari 3197, he says that time has returned to its original form from when Allah created the heavens and the earth, and that the year is twelve months, four of them sacred: "Three are in succession Dhul-Qa' da, Dhul-Hijja and Muharram," and the fourth is Rajab of the tribe of Mudar, which comes between Jumada al-Thani and Sha'ban.

Al-Bukhari also places the same narration under his commentary on verse 9:36, in Sahih al-Bukhari 4662. The longer version in Sahih Muslim 1679a states that this was said in the Farewell Address. There the Prophet ﷺ goes on to ask which month it is, and the Companions confirm it is Dhu al-Hijjah. He then tells them that their blood, property and honour are sacred to one another, like the sacredness of that day, in that city, in that month.

That last line shows how the idea of a sacred month was used: the sanctity of the month was a standard everyone already understood, and the Prophet ﷺ used it to explain the sanctity of human life and property.

Why "Rajab of Mudar"?

The hadith specifies Rajab "of Mudar." A note in the sunnah.com English translation of Bukhari 4662 explains that it was named after the tribe of Mudar because they used to respect this month. Its wording, "which stands between Jumad (ath-thani) and Sha'ban," fixes Rajab in its place as the 7th month. That precision mattered because of nasi': some Arabs had been shifting which month was treated as sacred, and the hadith ties Rajab to its actual position in the year.

Three consecutive months and one alone

The four months are not spread evenly. Three of them form one block of about three lunar months around the Hajj, and Rajab sits on its own in the middle of the year.

The commentary of Ibn Kathir on 9:36, available in English on quran.com's tafsir page for this verse, gives the traditional explanation. The month before Hajj, Dhu al-Qi'dah, let pilgrims travel to Makkah in safety. Dhu al-Hijjah is the month of Hajj itself, and Muharram let them return home safely. Rajab, in the middle of the year, allowed people from distant regions to visit the Sacred House for 'Umrah and go back in safety. Ibn Kathir sums up the purpose as making Hajj and 'Umrah possible "with ease."

Because the Hijri year opens with Muharram and closes with Dhu al-Qi'dah and Dhu al-Hijjah, the consecutive block crosses the turn of the Hijri year. The sister post on Dhu al-Qi'dah, the sacred month before Hajj looks at the first month of that block in detail.

What the sanctity of these months means

The sanctity of the sacred months has two parts in the classical sources: a restriction on fighting, and a heightened concern with wrongdoing in general.

A ban on fighting that predates Islam

The Arabs held these months sacred before Islam. Encyclopaedia Britannica's entry on Ashura notes that the name Muharram comes from the Arabic root h-r-m, one meaning of which is "forbidden," and that Muharram was traditionally one of the four sacred months when fighting was not allowed.

The Quran addresses fighting in these months directly. In Surah al-Baqarah 2:217, people ask the Prophet ﷺ about fighting in the sacred month, and the answer begins, in the Sahih International rendering: "Fighting therein is great [sin]." The verse adds that turning people away from the way of Allah and expelling the people of the Sacred Mosque are greater still. Surah al-Ma'idah 5:2 tells believers not to violate "[the sanctity of] the sacred month," and 2:194 addresses the case where fighting in a sacred month is a response to aggression committed in it.

Scholars have discussed how these verses relate to later verses on fighting, and whether the restriction on beginning hostilities in these months still applies. Ibn Kathir, in his commentary on 9:36, holds that starting a battle in the sacred months is forbidden, while fighting back against those who begin hostilities is allowed. Other scholars have taken different views. This post describes the texts; for a ruling, ask a qualified scholar.

Wrongdoing weighs more in these months

The phrase "do not wrong yourselves during them" is usually read more broadly than warfare. In the same tafsir, Ibn Kathir reports that the Companion Ibn Abbas said Allah singled out four months and made their sanctity greater, so that sins in them are greater and good deeds earn a greater reward. He also quotes the early scholar Qatadah: "Injustice during the Sacred Months is worse and graver than injustice in other months," while injustice is wrong at any time.

In practice, many Muslims treat the sacred months as a time to be especially careful about sins and to keep up good habits. The texts above do not attach a specific ritual to the four months as a group.

Is there a special fast for the sacred months?

No authentic text assigns one set fast to all four sacred months. Several months in the group do have their own recommended days. In Sahih Muslim 1163a, the Prophet ﷺ said the most excellent fast after Ramadan is in "God's month, al-Muharram." The first ten days of Dhu al-Hijjah and the Day of Arafah also have their own texts, covered in the post on the first ten days of Dhu al-Hijjah.

A narration often quoted on this topic, in which the Prophet ﷺ tells a man to "fast during the inviolable months and then stop," is in Sunan Abi Dawud 2428. Sunnah.com shows its grade as Da'if (weak) according to al-Albani, so it should not be used as evidence for a fixed fasting practice. Specific practices tied to Rajab are also a subject of discussion among scholars; the post on Rajab, the seventh month goes through those texts.

Calculated dates for the next sacred months

The table below gives the next four sacred months in order, followed by Rajab 1449. Each Islamic day begins at sunset on the evening before the Gregorian date shown.

The consecutive block of 1448-1449 therefore runs for 88 days, from Thursday 8 April to Sunday 4 July 2027. Dates are calculated from the Umm al-Qura tables in the open-source hijri-converter library (@tabby_ai/hijri-converter) that this site uses. Communities that begin months by a local crescent sighting may start a month a day earlier or later.

Find the sacred months on your calendar

To see where the sacred months fall in a given year, open the list of Islamic months, which shows all twelve with their order. For day-by-day views, the calendars for Rajab 1448 and Dhu al-Qi'dah 1448 show each date with its Gregorian equivalent. If you plan around these months, mark the calculated start dates as provisional and confirm them with your local mosque or the authority you follow when each month is announced.