Figures
Kiraman Katibin
Angels
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The noble scribes: the two angels who record a person's deeds, named in the Quran at 82:10-12 as honourable recorders who know what you do, and described at 50:17-18 as two receivers seated on the right and on the left, with not a word uttered but that a watcher is ready.
Popular teaching assigns the angel on the right to good deeds and the one on the left to bad, and adds that the recorder of bad deeds delays before writing to allow time for repentance. That elaboration comes from the commentary and homiletic literature, not from the verses themselves, and it is worth separating the two.
The record they keep is what is placed in the right or the left hand at the judgement and what is weighed on the scales, so the doctrine connects directly to the eschatology. Its practical function in Islamic moral teaching is the awareness of being observed at every moment, which is the same disposition the term taqwa names and the reason the two are so often taught together.
Facts
Attestation
HistoricityNot a historical person: a divine or other-than-human being 2 Traditions Revering This Figure Attributions
Mythic AssociationNamed in the Quran (82:10-12) as two recording angels, traditionally understood as one seated on each shoulder, who record every deed a person performs during their lifetime. 2 TraditionReferenced in Quran 82:10-12 as a pair of recording angels, one on each shoulder, who note every human deed for review on the Day of Judgment, a doctrine that shapes Islamic teaching on personal moral accountability. 1 Status
Status Within the TraditionTheir record is understood in mainstream Islamic theology as the book each person receives in their right or left hand at judgment, per Surah 17:13-14. 2 History
Historical NoteThe popular teaching that the recorder of bad deeds delays before writing, to allow time for repentance, comes from commentary and homiletic literature rather than from the Quranic verses themselves. 2 Life
Office HeldHeld to sit one on each shoulder of every person, one recording good deeds and one recording bad, a pairing named directly at Surah 50:17-18. 1 Associated RelicThe record of deeds, placed in the hand at judgement 2 Identity
Canonical ReferenceNamed directly at Quran 82:10-12 and again, without a personal name, at Quran 50:17-18, the two passages that establish the doctrine. 1 GenderCollective / plural, not a single figure 2 A pair, not a single figure Position Profile
Key TextThe Qur'an describes them at Surah al-Infitar 82:10 to 12 as noble recorders stationed with every person, knowing whatever is done, a pairing later Islamic tradition assigns to the right shoulder for good deeds and the left for wrong ones. 1 Origins
Origin of the NameThe Arabic phrase kiraman katibin means noble writers or honorable scribes, describing their function rather than serving as a personal name. 2 Learn More
The Recording Angels on Either Shoulder
The Kiraman Katibin, the "noble scribes," are the pair of angels who record every deed a person performs. The Quran names them at 82:10-12, "over you are keepers, noble recorders, who know whatever you do", and describes them at 50:17-18 as two receivers seated on the right and on the left, so that "not a word does he utter but there is a watcher by him, ready."
Tradition developed this into a settled image: the angel on the right records good deeds, the angel on the left records sins, and their ledger is the record that will be handed to each person at the judgement, placed in the right hand of the saved and the left of the damned. The doctrine gives the ordinary moral life a continuous divine witness: nothing is unobserved, and the account is being written at every moment. It is among the most practically felt of Islamic beliefs about the unseen, a constant reminder that shapes conduct in the awareness of being recorded.
An Old Idea, Personified Differently by Different Traditions
The Qur'anic basis for the two recording angels is a passage in Surah Qaf describing two receivers seated on the right and left recording every word a person utters, a text that establishes the function clearly but does not supply personal names for the two figures. The names and further descriptive detail commonly attached to them today developed through later exegesis and hadith rather than appearing in the Qur'an itself. The underlying idea, that a person's deeds are tallied by a heavenly record kept by an appointed angelic scribe or scribes, is considerably older than Islam and appears in earlier Second Temple Jewish literature, including the Book of Enoch's references to heavenly tablets and books recording human conduct, and in various strands of later Jewish and Christian tradition describing a book of life or book of deeds consulted at judgment.
Different traditions personify the recording function differently, sometimes as a single angelic scribe, sometimes as a pair as in the Islamic case, sometimes as an impersonal heavenly ledger with no angel attached to it at all, which suggests the core concept, that conduct is recorded rather than simply remembered, circulated widely across the ancient and late antique Near East and was independently given angelic form, with varying detail, by more than one religious tradition drawing on a shared cultural inheritance.
Cross-Tradition Connections
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