Mâlik Al-Mulk: The King of Absolute Sovereignty

"Say: 'Oh Allah! King of Absolute Sovereignty (Mâlik Al-Mulk), You give power to whom You please and You strip off power from whom You please; You endow with honor whom You please and You bring low whom You please. In Your hand is all good. Verily over all things You have power'" (3:26).

The King of Absolute Sovereignty is the quality of carrying out what Allah wills in Allah's kingdom in the manner Allah Wills, bringing into being, destroying, perpetuating, and annihilating as Allah pleases. The word Al-Mulk here means 'kingdom', and the word Al-Malik means 'the powerful one', 'the one who possesses perfect power'. The totality of everything in existence forms a single kingdom. Allah rules and has power over it. The totality of existing things are a single kingdom because they are dependent upon each other. Even if they are numerous in one respect, they still remain a unit in another. An example of this is the human body. Certainly it is a kingdom for the real nature of human beings. It consists of different members, but they all give the appearance of cooperating in attaining the goal of a single manager and thus the kingdom is one.