Shifa is an Arabic name meaning 'healing' or 'cure.'
Shifa comes from the Arabic root sh-f-y, meaning 'healing' or 'cure,' and it is a name saturated with both medical and spiritual significance. In the Quran, the word shifa appears in passages describing the holy text itself as a healing for what lies in the hearts of believers, and honey is described as a shifa for mankind — making the word a bridge between physical and metaphysical restoration. It is a name that evokes wholeness, the mending of what was broken, the return to health.
Among the most remarkable early bearers of the name is Al-Shifa bint Abdullah al-Adawiyya, a woman of the Quraysh tribe who became one of the first literate women in pre-Islamic and early Islamic Arabia. She taught writing to other women, including some of the Prophet Muhammad's wives, and later served as a market inspector in Medina under Caliph Umar — one of the earliest documented administrative roles held by a woman in Islamic history. Her life gives the name Shifa a legacy of intelligence, practical authority, and the transmission of knowledge alongside its healing connotations.
Shifa remains popular across the Arab world, South Asia, and among Muslim communities globally. It is frequently given to girls born into medical families or to children born after a period of hardship — the name as a kind of prayer that the child will bring healing into the world. Its two syllables are direct and warm, and its meaning carries a gentleness that makes it feel both aspirational and tender.