Tasbeeh

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Tasbeeh (Arabic: تسبیح) is, in Islam, the ritual process of glorifying or praising Allah (God) or the Prophet Muhammad. The word literally means, as a verb, "to travel swiftly" and as a noun, "duties" or "occupation", with the implied meaning in this context being "to carry out duties assigned by Allah swiftly and expeditiously". It is one of the many means of Dhikr or remembrance of Allah. Usually it involves reciting Islamic mantra glorifying Allah and the Prophet Muhammad, of which there are various combinations and varieties.

This is often done with a prayer bead, (using beads is considered Bid‘ah by some scholars) usually numbering 99 or 33 (99 being the number of names for Allah in Islam - e.g. The Most Kind, The Most Merciful, etc. - and 33 being a number that easily divides into 99), which is very similar to a rosary or worry beads. Such beads are also known as a Tasbeeh.

An example of Tasbeeh would be to say "Allahu Akbar" (God is Great) 34 times, to say "Alhamdulillah" (All praise to Allah) 33 (times, and to say "Subhanallah" (Glory to Allah) 33 times. Note that "Allahu Akbar" has one more repetition than the other two ("Alhamdulillah and Subhanallah").