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</ref> describing the physical manifestation of God on Earth. <ref>Durie, Mark. ''The Qur'an and Its Biblical Reflexes: Investigations into the Genesis of a Religion. pp.177-178.'' Lanham, MD: Lexington Books, 2018</ref> This term is used in the Qur'an,    

 

The Qur’anic noun sakīnah appears six times, mostly in Medinan verses. Linked to the root s-k-n (“rest, repose, stillness”), it denotes a divinely granted calm or fortification, often in situations of fear or external threat. In five occurrences (Q 9:26, 9:40, 48:4, 48:18, 48:26), God “sends down” sakīnah into believers’ hearts, strengthening their faith. A related concept appears in Q 3:154 and 8:11, where God sends down “security.” The sixth occurrence (Q 2:248) associates sakīnah with the Israelite ark, providing reassurance of Saul’s legitimacy as king. Etymologically, sakīnah derives from rabbinic Hebrew/Aramaic shekinah (“God’s dwelling/presence”), but the Qur’an reshapes its meaning. Unlike the Jewish sense of God’s tangible presence in a place, the Qur’anic sakīnah emphasizes inner reassurance and divine support, integrating it into a theology of God fortifying believers’ hearts rather than manifesting in sacred locations. (Sinai summary pp390-391)  

{{Quote|<i>sakīnah {{!}} composure, tranquillity</i> Sinai, Nicolai. Key Terms of the Qur'an: A Critical Dictionary (pp. 391). Princeton University Press. Kindle Edition.|..Etymologically, the word is descended from rabbinic Hebrew shәkinah or its Aramaic equivalent (WMJA 53–55; NB 24–25; JPND 208–209; CQ 21; FVQ 174; Stewart 2021, 42–54), which in targumic and rabbinic texts designate God’s “dwelling” or “presence” in the world and can on occasion appear as a downright hypostasis of the deity (see DTTM 1573 and DJBA 1145 as well as the overview in Unterman et al. 2007). The Qur’anic use of sakīnah, a word that was presumably adopted from the language of the Medinan Jews, is an evident case in which the semantics of a loanword underwent far-reaching adjustment in accordance with the meaning of its Arabic root s-k-n, conveying rest and calmness. As a result, the Qur’anic sakīnah, though explicitly identified as being God’s, has a distinctly psychological slant and does not convey the presence of God at a particular place, as does the rabbinic concept (Durie 2018, 178–179). One may surmise that the Jews of Medina employed the word sakīnah to describe God’s presence in the ark of the covenant (Q 2:248). This would be in line with God’s statement in Exod 25:8 that he will “dwell” in the Israelites’ sanctuary, which the Targum Onqelos renders, “And I shall cause my presence (shkinti) to dwell among them.” The Qur’an, by contrast, integrates the term into the theme of God’s reassuring impact on the believers’ hearts, into which the sakīnah is sent down according to Q 48:4 (see AHW 67 and under → qalb). Thus, while the concept’s original doctrinal context was a theology of God’s presence at particular places and times (see Durie 2018, 179), in its Qur’anic reception it is absorbed into what one might call the Islamic scripture’s theology of divine fortification: the prime arena in which God can be experienced as present, above and beyond his universal role as the world’s creator and sustainer (→ khalaqa), is the human heart.}}