The Quranic prayer of Jonah, called Yunus in Arabic, condenses declaration of God's oneness, praise of God's transcendence, and confession of personal wrongdoing into a single short sentence spoken, the Quran says, while he was inside the fish: there is no god but You, exalted are You, indeed I have been among the wrongdoers. Islamic commentary has repeatedly highlighted this three-part compression as a model of efficient repentance, since the prayer accomplishes theological affirmation and personal confession together rather than treating them as separate steps, and several hadith traditions record the Prophet Muhammad recommending its use by anyone in serious distress, not only in circumstances resembling Jonah's own confinement.
The surrounding Quranic narrative recounts that Jonah had left his community without divine permission before being swallowed, and that God, on hearing this prayer, delivered him, a sequence of disobedience, distress, confession and deliverance that commentators frequently cite as a compact model of the mechanics of repentance within Islamic theology more broadly. Jonah is also distinguished among the Quran's prophets by a specific divine reassurance elsewhere in the text that had he not been one of those who glorify God, he would have remained inside the fish until the day of resurrection, a statement commentators connect directly back to the content of this prayer.