A verse of the Qur’an, (pl. āyāt). It is the smallest semantically independent Qur’anic speech. Cognates of the word āya occur also in Hebrew and Syriac, and the term is often translated as a sign. The word also refers to miracles, as in the birth of Jesus to the Virgin Mary (Q. 19:21); and wonders of nature as signs of God’s power in the universe (see, e.g. Q. 30:20–25). The number of āyāt (verses) differs from one sura to another. An individual verse may be just a single word or long passages; the longest āya in the Qur’an is the verse known as al-Dayn ‘the Debt’, Q. 2: 282.
