Israfil (Isráfíl) is the great angel of the trumpet in Islamic tradition: one of the foremost archangels, the angel who will sound the trumpet (the Sūr) to announce the Day of Resurrection and the end of the world, the herald of the Last Day whose blast will end all life and then raise the dead, a mighty angel ever poised with the trumpet at his lips awaiting God’s command. He is the angel of the trumpet, the herald of the Resurrection.
The Angel of the Trumpet
Israfil (Isráfíl, sometimes identified with the biblical Raphael) is one of the great archangels of Islamic tradition — reckoned, with Jibril (Gabriel), Mikail (Michael), and Azrael (the angel of death), among the four greatest of the angels (the mala’ika), the mighty spirits created by God of light to serve and worship Him and carry out His will. Israfil’s great and awesome office is to sound the trumpet — the Sūr, the great horn — that will announce the Day of Judgment and the Resurrection. He is the angel of the Last Day, the herald whose blast will mark the end of the world and the beginning of the Judgment.
The Blast of the Last Day
According to Islamic tradition, Israfil stands ever ready, the great trumpet poised at his lips, his gaze fixed upon the Throne of God, awaiting only the command to blow — for the hour of the Last Day is known only to God, and Israfil waits in readiness through all the ages of the world. When God commands, Israfil will sound the trumpet: at the first blast (the “blast of terror” or “of swooning”), all living things in the heavens and the earth will be struck down and perish, the order of the cosmos undone, the mountains crumbling and the stars falling, and all creation will die. Then, after an appointed time, at God’s command Israfil will sound the trumpet a second time (the “blast of resurrection”), and at that blast the dead will rise from their graves, restored to life, to be gathered for the Judgment. Thus Israfil’s trumpet both ends the world and raises the dead.
The Herald of the Resurrection
Israfil is described in the tradition as a being of immense majesty and beauty, one of the bearers of God’s Throne, of vast size, with wings, who reads the decisions written on the Preserved Tablet and conveys God’s commands. He is the angel most associated with the trumpet and the Last Day, and his readiness to sound it is a powerful image of the imminence and certainty of the Resurrection and the Judgment in Islamic thought. As one of the four great archangels, the angel of the trumpet whose blast will end the world and raise the dead, Israfil holds a place of the highest honour among the angels. In Israfil, Islamic tradition gave form to the angel of the trumpet — the mighty herald who stands ever ready to sound the Sūr at God’s command, ending the world with one blast and raising the dead with another, the angel of the Resurrection.