الحيّ ، المحيي
al-Ḥayy, al-Muḥyī
Topic
Two divine names: the Ever-Living, and the One Who gives life.
What it means
Al-Ḥayy is the Ever-Living. It appears at the opening of the Throne Verse: “God, there is no god but He, the Ever-Living, the Self-Subsisting” (2:255), and in surah 3 (3:2). The Quran also says: “Put your trust in the Ever-Living, who does not die” (25:58). His life has no beginning and no end, and it is the source of the life of all else.
Al-Muḥyī is the One Who gives life. The Quran points to the revival of dead land after rain as a sign that He raises the dead: “Look at the traces of God’s mercy, how He gives life to the earth after its death” (30:50). Faruqi joins the two names, since the Ever-Living is the giver of life. The pair appears in prayers such as the supplication yā ḥayyu yā qayyūm, “O Ever-Living, O Self-Subsisting”.
Often misunderstood as
Both are rendered with the English “living” alone; the Quran presents the Ever-Living as the source of every other life.
Term and Arabic as listed in Ismail al Faruqi, Toward Islamic English (International Institute of Islamic Thought, 1995), p. 31, listed as AL ḤAYY, AL MUḤYĪ. The definition is restated here.