How Often Should Al-Baqarah Be Recited to Keep Devils out of a House?
Shaykh Ṣāliḥ ibn Fawzān al-Fawzān, The Permanent Committee for Scholarly Research and Fatwas, ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz ibn ʿAbd Allāh ibn Bāz
Categorized under: Dhikr, Explanations, Fatāwá and Rulings, Ḥadīth, Qurʿān, Recitation, Supplications and Words of Remembrance
Question No. 3 from Fatwa No. 18072
The Messenger ﷺ said: “Don’t turn your houses into grave sites; indeed, devils don’t enter a house in which Surah Al-Baqarah is recited.”¹
Is what’s intended by reciting Surah Al-Baqarah [reciting it just] one time in a house when the person of [that house] moves into it? Or [reciting it] every year? Or every night?
Answer
There is no specific number set for [how often] Surah Al-Baqarah should be recited. The ḥadīth only indicates that it is recommended [in Islam] to keep [our] homes established upon prayers and recitation of the Qurʾān, just as it shows that devils flee from houses in which Surah Al-Baqarah is recited.
And there is no specific number set for that, so [the ḥadīth] indicates that reciting it a lot is always something preferable [and rewardable in Islam ]—in order to drive out devils and [also] due to what [reciting the Qurʾān] has of tremendous virtue and excellence, for every word [recited counts] as a good deed, and a good deed [gets the reward] of ten like itself, as has been mentioned in another ḥadīth.
And it is only by Allāh that one can achieve that which [is pleasing to Him]. And may Allāh increase our prophet Muḥammad, his family, and his companions in His praise for them before His highest gathering of angels, and may He grant them more protection from every kind of fault and harm.
The Permanent Committee for Scholarly Research and Fatwas
¹Refer to Al-Albānī’s Ṣaḥīḥ Al-Tirmidhī, 2877 (TN)
Source: Fatāwá Al-Lajnah Al-Dāʾimah, vol. 3, pp. 127-28.