Michael (Ar. Mīkāʾīl or Mīkāl) is one of the four archangels (ruʾūs al-malāʾika) named in ḥadīth s and one of two angels named explicitly in the Qurʾān, the other being Gabriel (Ar. Jibrīl). Mīkāʾīl is derived from the Hebrew Mīkāʾel (one like God), but the Hebrew meaning is not carried into Arabic, where the name is meaningless. The ḥadīth and tafsīr (Qurʾānic commentary) literatures occasionally give the meaning of Mīkāʾil as either ʿabd Allāh or ʿubayd Allāh , both meaning servant of God (e.g., al-Rāzī, 1196; al-Suyūṭī,