Islam > Quran > Tajweed > Ibtida: definition and types
Updated on 04 October 2026 at 11:01 PM
📖 2 min readIbtida is the act of beginning the recitation, whether after a cutting off (qat') followed by turning away from it, or after a Waqf. If it takes place after a cutting off, the rules of isti'adhah and the basmalah must then be observed, as has already been explained.
As for the resumption after a Waqf, it is not necessary to pay attention to it, for the Waqf is only meant for rest and recovery of breath.
Imam Ibn al-Jazari said: ibtida can only be deliberate, for it is not like the Waqf towards which a necessity pushes; it is therefore permitted only with a statement independent in its meaning and sufficient for the intended purpose ¹.
Ibtida is of two types:
The first: resuming by it is permitted. The second: resuming by it is not permitted.
It is the ibtida by a statement independent in its meaning, such that one does not change what Allah, the Most High, intended. Its examples are evident and clear; they do not need to be laid out.
It is the ibtida by a statement that corrupts the meaning, destroys it or changes it. This varies in badness: if you begin with a word connected to what precedes by wording and meaning, like the words of the Most High أَبِي لَهَبٍ وَتَبَّ ², it is a bad ibtida, for it renders the meaning truncated, and one must then resume from what precedes.
But if you begin with a word that changes the meaning of what Allah, the Most High, intended, like يَدُ اللَّهِ مَغْلُولَةٌ ³, and His words عُزَيْرٌ ابْنُ اللَّهِ ⁴, and His words وَإِيَّاكُمْ أَنْ تُؤْمِنُوا بِاللَّهِ رَبِّكُمْ ⁵, and His words لا أَعْبُدُ الَّذِي فَطَرَنِي ⁶, then it is even worse. All of that and its likes is manifestly bad, and it falls to the reader to avoid it as much as he can.
Resembling the Waqf: the Sakt and the qat' (the cutting off). What follows is the exposition of each of them.