Alas, don't tell me the Christians are lost.
Don't tell me the Jews are lost.
Don't tell me the infidels are lost.
Alas, my brother, you are lost,
That is why everyone else seems lost.
- RUMI
Mary (Arabic: مريم, translit. Maryam), the mother of Jesus (Isa), holds a singularly exalted place in Islam as the only woman named in the Quran, which refers to her seventy times and explicitly identifies her as the greatest of all women,[2][3][4] stating, with reference to the angelic saluation during the annunciation, "O Mary, God has chosen you, and purified you; He has chosen you above all the women of creation."[5] In the Quran, her story is related in three Meccan chapters (19, 21, 23) and four Medinan chapters (3, 4, 5, 66), and the nineteenth chapter of the scripture, the Chapter of Mary (Surat Maryam), is named after her. The Quran refers to Mary more than the entire New Testament.[6]