far from the river Jordan; but others call it the well of Egypt, or
Midian. The commentators tell us that when the sons of Jacob had
gotten Joseph with them in the field, they began to abuse and to beat
him so unmercifully that they had killed him had not Judah on his
crying out for help insisted on the promise they had made not to kill
him but to cast him into the well. Whereupon they let him down a
little way; but as he held by the sides of the well, they bound him,
and took off his inner garment, designing to stain it with blood to
deceive their father. Joseph begged hard to have his garment returned
to him, but to no purpose, his brothers telling him, with a sneer,
that the eleven stars and the sun and the moon might clothe him and
keep him company.—S. (B., Z.)
[223] The commentators pretend that Gabriel also clothed him in the
well with a garment of silk of Paradise. For they say that when
Abraham was thrown into the fire by Nimrod, he was stripped; and that
Gabriel brought him this garment and put it on him; and that from
Abraham it descended to Jacob, who folded it up and put it into an
amulet, which he hung about Joseph’s neck, whence Gabriel drew it
out.—S. (B., Z.)
[224] These races they used by way of exercise; and the commentators
generally understand here that kind of race wherein they also showed
their dexterity in throwing darts, which is still used in the East.—S.
[225] This Jacob had reason to suspect, because when the garment was
brought to him, he observed that, though it was bloody, yet it was not
torn.—S. (B.)
[226] Three days after Joseph had been thrown into it.—S.
[227] The commentators are so exact as to give us the name of this
man, who as they pretend, was Málik Ibn-Doạr, of the tribe of
Khuzá´ah.—S. (B.)
[228] The expositors are not agreed whether the pronoun _they_ relates
to Málik and his companions, or to Joseph’s brethren. They who espouse
the former opinion say that those who came to draw water concealed the
manner of their coming by him from the rest of the caravan, that they
might keep him to themselves; pretending that some people of the place
had given him to them to sell for them in Egypt. And they who prefer
the latter opinion tell us that Judah carried victuals to Joseph every
day while he was in the well; but not finding him there on the fourth
day, he acquainted his brothers with it: whereupon they all went to
the caravan and claimed Joseph as their slave, he not daring to
discover that he was their brother, lest something worse should befall
him; and at length they agreed to sell him to them.—S. (B.)
[229] A corruption of Potiphar. He was a man of great consideration,
being superintendent of the royal treasury.—S. (B.)
[230] That is, to Ḳiṭfeer and his friends. The occasion of Joseph’s
imprisonment is said to be either that they suspected him to be guilty
notwithstanding the proofs which had been given of his innocence, or
else that Zeleekha desired it, feigning, to deceive her husband, that
she wanted to have Joseph removed from her sight till she could
conquer her passion by time; though her real design was to force him
to compliance.—S.
[231] According to the explication of some who take the pronoun _him_
to relate to Joseph, this passage may be rendered, ‘But the devil
caused him (_i.e._, Joseph) to forget to make his application unto his
lord;’ and to beg the good offices of his fellow-prisoner for his
deliverance, instead of relying on God alone, as it became a prophet,
especially, to have done.—S. (B.)
[232] This prince, as the Oriental writers generally agree, was
Er-Reiyán the son of El-Weleed the Amalekite, who was converted by
Joseph to the worship of the true God, and died in the lifetime of
that prophet. But some pretend that the Pharaoh of Joseph and of Moses
were one and the same person, and that he lived (or rather reigned)
four hundred years.—S. (B.)
[233] The commentators say that Joseph, being taken out of prison,
after he had washed and changed his clothes, was introduced to the
king, whom he saluted in the Hebrew tongue, and on the king’s asking
what language that was, he answered that it was the language of his
fathers. This prince, they say, understood no less than seventy
languages, in every one of which he discoursed with Joseph, who
answered him in the same; at which the king, greatly marvelling,
desired him to relate his dream, which he did, describing the most
minute circumstances: whereupon the king placed Joseph by him on his
throne, and made him his Wezeer, or chief minister.—S. (B.)
[234] Namely, Ephraim and Manasses: so that according to this
tradition, she was the same woman who is called Asenath by ‘Moses.’
This supposed marriage, which authorized their amours, probably
encouraged the Moḥammadan divines to make use of the loves of Joseph
and Zeleekha as an allegorical emblem of the spiritual love between
the Creator and the creature, God and the soul; just as the Christians
apply the Song of Solomon to the same mystical purpose.—S.
[235] Joseph, being made Wezeer, governed with great wisdom; for he
not only caused justice to be impartially administered and encouraged
the people to industry and the improvement of agriculture during the
seven years of plenty, but began and perfected several works of great
benefit; the natives at this day ascribing to the patriarch Joseph
almost all the ancient works of public utility throughout the kingdom;
as particularly the rendering the province of El-Feiyoom, from a
standing pool or marsh, the most fertile and best-cultivated land in
all Egypt. When the years of famine came, the effects of which were
felt not only in Egypt but in Syria and the neighbouring countries,
the inhabitants were obliged to apply to Joseph for corn, which he
sold to them, first for their money, jewels, and ornaments, then for
their cattle and lands, and at length for their persons; so that all
the Egyptians in general became slaves to the king, though Joseph by
his consent soon released them and returned them their substance.—S.
(B.)
[236] At length Joseph asked them whom they had to vouch for their
veracity; but they told him they knew no man who could vouch for them
in Egypt. Then, replied he, one of you shall stay behind with me as a
pledge, and the others may return home with their provision; and when
ye come again, ye shall bring your younger brother with you, that I
may know ye have told me the truth. Whereupon, it being in vain to
dispute the matter, they cast lots who should stay behind, and the lot
fell upon Simeon. When they departed, Joseph gave each of them a
camel, and another for their brother.—S. (B.)
[237] The original word signifying not only money but also goods
bartered or given in exchange for other merchandise, some commentators
tell us that they paid for their corn, not in money, but in shoes and
dressed skins.—S. (B.)
[238] The belief in the influence of the evil eye prevails among all
the Muslims, even the most religious and learned; for their prophet
said, ‘The eye hath a complete influence; because verily, if there
were a thing to overcome fate, it most certainly would be a malignant
eye.’ Hence he permitted charms (which he disallowed in almost every
other case) to be employed for the purpose of counteracting its
influence.
[239] It is related that Joseph, having invited his brethren to an
entertainment, ordered them to be placed two and two together; by
which means, Benjamin, the eleventh, was obliged to sit alone, and,
bursting into tears, said, If my brother Joseph were alive, he would
have sat with me. Whereupon Joseph ordered him to be seated at the
same table with himself, and when the entertainment was over,
dismissed the rest, ordering that they should be lodged two and two in
a house, but kept Benjamin in his own apartment, where he passed the
night. The next day, Joseph asked him whether he would accept of
himself for his brother, in the room of him whom he had lost; to which
Benjamin replied, ‘Who can find a brother comparable unto thee? Yet
thou art not the son of Jacob and Rachel.’ And upon this, Joseph
discovered himself to him.—S. (B.).
[240] Some, however, are of opinion that it was a drinking-cup.
[241] The occasion of this suspicion, it is said, was that Joseph
having been brought up by his father’s sister, she became so fond of
him, that when he grew up and Jacob designed to take him from her she
contrived the following stratagem to keep him. Having a girdle which
had once belonged to Abraham, she girt it about the child, and then
pretending she had lost it, caused strict search to be made for it;
and it being at length found on Joseph, he was adjudged, according to
the above-mentioned law of the family, to be delivered to her as her
property. Some, however, say that Joseph actually stole an idol of
gold, which belonged to his mother’s father, and destroyed it; a story
probably taken from Rachel’s stealing the images of Laban: and others
tell us that he once stole a goat or a hen, to give to a poor man.—S.
[242] Miṣr is the name both of Egypt and its capital.
[243] The injury they did Benjamin was the separating him from his
brother, after which they kept him in so great subjection that he
durst not speak to them but with the utmost submission. Some say that
these words were occasioned by a letter which Joseph’s brethren
delivered to him from their father, requesting the releasement of
Benjamin, and by their representing his extreme affliction at the loss
of him and his brother. The commentators observe that Joseph, to
excuse his brethren’s behaviour towards him, attributes it to their
ignorance and the heat of youth.—S. (B.)
[244] The frontier town of Egypt towards Syria.
[245] El-Beyḍáwee tell us that Joseph sent carriages and provisions
for his father and his family; and that he and the king of Egypt went
forth to meet them. He adds that the number of the children of Israel
who entered Egypt with him was seventy-two; and that when they were
led out thence by Moses, they were increased to six hundred thousand
five hundred and seventy men, and upwards, besides the old people and
children.—S.
[246] A transposition is supposed to be in these words:—he seated his
father and mother after they had bowed down to him, and not before.—S.
(B.)
[247] But when Moses led the Israelites out of Egypt, he took up the
coffin, and carried Joseph’s bones with him into Canaan, where he
buried them by his ancestors.—S. (B.)
[248] The Moḥammadan writers tell us that Job was of the race of Esau,
and was blessed with a numerous family and abundant riches; but that
God proved him by taking away all that he had, even his children, who
were killed by the fall of a house; notwithstanding which he continued
to serve God and to return Him thanks as usual; that he was then
struck with a filthy disease, his body being full of worms and so
offensive that as he lay on the dunghill none could bear to come near
him: that his wife, however (whom some call Raḥmeh the daughter of
Ephraim the son of Joseph, and others Makhir the daughter of
Manasses), attended him with great patience, supporting him with what
she earned by her labour; but that the devil appearing to her one day,
after having reminded her of her past prosperity, promised her that if
she would worship him, he would restore all they had lost; whereupon
she asked her husband’s consent, who was so angry at the proposal,
that he swore, if he recovered, to give his wife a hundred stripes.—S.
(B., J., A.F.)
[249] Some say there were two springs, one of hot water wherein he
bathed, and the other of cold of which he drank.—S. (B.)
[250] His wife also becoming young and handsome again, and bearing him
twenty-six sons. Some, to express the great riches which were bestowed
on Job after his sufferings, say he had two threshing-floors, one for
wheat and the other for barley, and that God sent two clouds, which
rained gold on the one and silver on the other till they ran
over.—(J.) The traditions differ as to the continuance of Job’s
calamities: one will have it to be eighteen years; another, thirteen;
another, three; and another, exactly seven years seven months and
seven hours.—S.
[251] Or ‘a palm-branch having a hundred leaves.’—S.
[252] But see note 1 (248).
[253] The commentators generally suppose him to be the same person
with the father-in-law of Moses, who is named in Scripture Reuel or
Raguel, and Jethro. But Aḥmad Ibn-´Abd-El-Ḥaleem charges those who
entertain this opinion with ignorance. They say (after the Jews) that
he gave his son-in-law [Moses] that wonder-working rod with which he
performed all those miracles in Egypt and the Desert, and also
excellent advice and instructions; whence he had the surname of
‘Khaṭeeb-el-Ambiya,’ or ‘the Preacher to the Prophets.’—S.
[254] The Arabic word ‘ḍa´eef’ (weak) signifying also in the
Ḥimyaritic dialect ‘blind,’ some suppose that Sho´eyb was so, and that
the Midianites objected that to him as a defect which disqualified him
for the prophetic office.—S.
[255] Which of the kings of Egypt this Pharaoh of Moses was is
uncertain. Not to mention the opinions of the European writers, those
of the East generally suppose him to have been El-Weleed, who
according to some was an Arab of the tribe of ´Ád, or according to
others the son of Muṣ´ab the son of Er-Reiyán the son of El-Weleed the
Amalekite. There are historians, however, who suppose Ḳáboos the
brother and predecessor of El-Weleed was the prince we are speaking
of, and pretend he lived six hundred and twenty years and reigned four
hundred. Which is more reasonable, at least, than the opinion of those
who imagine it was his father Muṣ´ab or grandfather Er-Reiyán.
Abu-l-Fida says the Muṣ´ab, being one hundred and seventy years old
and having no child, while he kept the herds saw a cow calve, and
heard her say at the same time, ‘O Muṣ´ab, be not grieved, for thou
shalt have a wicked son, who will be at length cast into hell.’ And he
accordingly had this Weleed, who afterwards coming to be king of Egypt
proved an impious tyrant.—S. (A.F., Z.)
[256] This name is given to Pharaoh’s chief minister; from whence it
is generally inferred that Moḥammad had been made Haman the favorite
of Ahasuerus king of Persia, and who indisputably lived many years
after Moses, to be that prophet’s contemporary.—S.
[257] It is related that the midwife appointed to attend the Hebrew
women, terrified by a light which appeared between the eyes of Moses
at his birth, and touched with an extraordinary affection for the
child, did not discover him to the officers, so that his mother kept
him in her house, and nursed him three months; after which it was
impossible for her to conceal him any longer, the king then giving
orders to make the searches more strictly.—S. (B.)
[258] The commentators say that his mother made an ark of the papyrus,
and pitched it, and put in some cotton; and having laid the child
therein, committed it to the river, a branch of which went into
Pharaoh’s garden: that the stream carried the ark thither into a
fishpond, at the head of which Pharaoh was then sitting with his wife
Ásiyeh the daughter of Muzáḥem; and that the king, having commanded it
to be taken up and opened, and finding in it a beautiful child, took a
fancy to it, and ordered it to be brought up.—Some writers mention a
miraculous preservation of Moses before he was put into the ark; and
tell us, that his mother having hid him from Pharaoh’s officers in an
oven, his sister, in her mother’s absence, kindled a large fire in the
oven to heat it, not knowing the child was there; but that he was
afterwards taken out unhurt.—S. (B., A.F.)
[259] Ḳur. xxvi. 17.
[260] This person, says the tradition, was an Egyptian and Pharaoh’s
uncle’s son.—S.
[261] The Jews pretend he was actually imprisoned for the fact, and
condemned to be beheaded; but that when he should have suffered his
neck became as hard as ivory, and the sword rebounded on the
executioner.—S.
[262] According to El-Beyḍáwee, Moses knew not the way, and, coming to
a place where three roads met, committed himself to the guidance of
God, and took the middle road, which was the right; Providence
likewise so ordering it that his pursuers took the other two roads,
and missed him.—S.
[263] This was Ṣafoora [also called Ṣafoorah and Ṣafooriya,
or Zipporah, the elder, or as others suppose the younger, daughter of
Sho´eyb, whom Moses afterwards married.—S.]
[264] The commentators say, that Moses, having obtained leave of
Sho´eyb or Jethro, his father-in-law, to visit his mother, departed
with his family from Midian towards Egypt; but coming to the valley of
Ṭuwa, wherein Mount Sinai stands, his wife fell in labour and was
delivered of a son in a very dark and snowy night: he had also lost
his way, and his cattle were scattered from him, when on a sudden he
saw a fire by the side of a mountain, which on his nearer approach he
found burning in a green bush.—S. (B.)
[265] This was a mark of humility and respect: though some fancy there
was some uncleanness in the shoes themselves, because they were made
of the skin of an ass not dressed.—S. (B.)
[266] Which was at first no bigger than the rod, but afterwards
swelled to a prodigious size.—S. (B.)
[267] When Moses saw the serpent move about with great nimbleness and
swallow stones and trees, he was greatly terrified, and fled from it;
but recovering his courage at these words of God, he had the boldness
to take the serpent by the jaws.—S. (B.)
[268] Moses had an impediment in his speech, which was occasioned by
the following accident. Pharaoh one day carrying him in his arms when
a child, he suddenly laid hold of his beard and plucked it in a very
rough manner, which put Pharaoh into such a passion that he ordered
him to be put to death: but Ásiyeh his wife representing to him that
he was but a child, who could not distinguish between a burning coal
and a ruby, he ordered the experiment to be made; and a live coal and
a ruby being set before Moses, he took the coal and put it into his
mouth, and burnt his tongue: and thereupon he was pardoned.—This is a
Jewish story a little altered.—S.
[269] For he was obliged to abandon his country and his friends, and
to travel several days in great terror and want of necessary
provisions to seek a refuge among strangers; and was afterwards forced
to serve for hire to gain a livelihood.—S.
[270] Aaron being by this time come out to meet his brother, either by
divine inspiration, or having notice of his design to return to
Egypt.—S. (B.)
[271] The Arab writers tell enormous fables of this serpent or dragon.
For they say that he was hairy and of so prodigious a size that when
he opened his mouth his jaws were fourscore cubits asunder and when he
laid his lower jaw on the ground his upper reached to the top of the
palace [or rather, I believe, the _throne_ of Pharaoh]: that Pharaoh,
seeing this monster make towards him, fled from it; and that the whole
assembly also betaking themselves to their heels, no less than
twenty-five thousand of them lost their lives in the press. They add
that Pharaoh, upon this abjured Moses by God who had sent him to take
away the serpent, and promised he would believe on Him and let the
Israelites go; but when Moses had done what he requested, he relapsed
and grew as hardened as before.—S. (B.)
[272] There is a tradition that Moses was a very swarthy man; and that
when he put his hand into his bosom, and drew it out again, it became
extremely white and splendid, surpassing the brightness of the sun.—S.
(B.)
[273] They provided themselves with a great number of thick ropes and
long pieces of wood, which they contrived by some means to move and
make them twist themselves one over the other; and so imposed on the
beholders, who at a distance took them to be true serpents. It is also
said that they rubbed them over with quicksilver, which being wrought
upon by the heat of the sun caused them to move.—S. (B.)
[274] The expositors add that when this serpent had swallowed up all
the rods and cords he made directly towards the assembly and put them
into so great a terror that they fled and a considerable number were
killed in the crowd: then Moses took it up and it became a rod in his
hand as before. Whereupon the magicians declared that it could be no
enchantment, because in such case their rods and cords would not have
disappeared.—S. (B.)
[275] Sale observes that some writers introduce only two of the
enchanters as acknowledging Moses’ miracle to be wrought by the power
of God. These two, they say, were brothers, and the sons of a famous
magician then dead; but on their being sent for to court on this
occasion, their mother persuaded them to go to their father’s tomb and
ask his advice. Being come to the tomb, the father answered their
call, and when they had acquainted him with the affair, he told them
that they should inform themselves whether the rod of which they spoke
became a serpent while its masters slept, or only when they were
awake; for, said he, enchantments have no effect while the enchanter
is asleep, and therefore if it be otherwise in this case, you may be
assured that they act by a divine power. These two magicians then,
arriving at the capital of Egypt, on inquiry found to their great
astonishment that when Moses and Aaron went to rest their rod became a
serpent and guarded them while they slept. And this was the first step
towards their conversion.—S.
[276] Some think these converted magicians were executed accordingly:
but others deny it, and say that the king was not able to put them to
death; insisting on these words of the Ḳur-án [xxviii. 35], ‘Ye two,
and they who follow you, shall overcome.’—S.
[277] See p. 101, l. 5, n. 1 (260).
[278] Cp. Act. Apost. v. 38, 39.
[279] ‘The people of Noah and of ´Ád and of Thamood, and those whom
God destroyed after them.’ So explained in the Ḳámoos.
[280] It is said that Hámán having prepared bricks and other materials
employed no less than fifty thousand men besides labourers in the
building, which they carried to so immense a height that the workmen
could no longer stand on it: that Pharaoh ascending this tower threw a
javelin towards heaven, which fell back again stained with blood,
whereupon he impiously boasted that he had killed the god of Moses;
but at sunset God sent the angel Gabriel, who with one stroke of his
wing demolished the tower, a part whereof falling on the king’s army
destroyed a million of men.—S. (Z.)
[281] Some are of opinion that those who were sent by Pharaoh to seize
the true believer, his kinsman, are the persons more particularly
meant in this place: for they tell us that the said believer fled to a
mountain, where they found him at prayers, guarded by the wild beasts,
which ranged themselves in order about him; and that his pursuers
thereupon returned in a great fright to their master, who put them to
death for not performing his command.—S. (B.)
[282] Some expound these words of the previous punishment they are
doomed to suffer, according to a tradition of Ibn-Mes´ood, which
informs us that their souls are in the crops of black birds which are
exposed to hell-fire every morning and evening until the Day of
Judgment.—S. (B.)
[283] As there is no mention of any such miraculous inundation in the
[so-called] Mosaic writings, some have imagined this plague to have
been either a pestilence, or the smallpox, or some other epidemical
distemper. (B.) For the word ‘ṭoofán,’ which is used in this place,
and is generally rendered a ‘deluge,’ may also signify any other
universal destruction or mortality.—S.
[284] That is, the land of Syria, of which the Eastern geographers
reckon Palestine a part, and wherein the commentators say the children
of Israel succeeded the kings of Egypt and the Amalekites.—S. (B.)
[285] Particularly the lofty tower [before mentioned] which Pharaoh
caused to be built, that he might attack the God of Moses.—S.
[286] The word here translated ‘body’ signifying also a ‘coat of
mail,’ some imagine the meaning to be that his corpse floated armed
with his coat of mail, which they tell us was of gold, by which they
knew it was he.—S.