The Qiṣaṣ al-anbiyāʾ (Arabic: قِصَص الْأَنـۢبِيَاء, lit. 'Stories of the Prophets') is any of various collections of stories about figures recognised as prophets and messengers in Islam, closely related to tafsīr (exegesis of the Qur'an).
Since the Quran refers only parabolically to the stories of the prophets, assuming the audience is able to complete the rest from their own knowledge, it became necessary to store the version the original audience had in mind to keep the purpose of the message, when Islam met other cultures during its expansion.