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Did the Prophet (peace and blessings of Allah be upon him) address his older relatives by their given names or by an honorific title, and should a person address someone ten years their senior, for example, with a title?

1 min readAlso available in العربية

The Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) addressed his uncle Al-Abbas and his aunt Safiyyah by their names, saying: "O Abbas ibn Abd al-Muttalib, I cannot avail you anything against Allah. And O Safiyyah, aunt of the Messenger of Allah, I cannot avail you anything against Allah." It is permissible to address someone by their common nickname, as long as it does not cause harm, according to the Almighty's saying: "And do not defame yourselves, nor call each other by offensive nicknames. Wretched is the name of disobedience after faith."

Summarized from the full answer at Ftawy · reviewed Sep 2, 2026

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