Surah Al-Baqarah 2:60-61 - Quran Translation Commentary

(2:60) And (recall) when Musa sought water for his people. We said: ‘Strike the stone¹⁴³ with your staff.' Lo! Gushed forth from it twelve fountains. All the people knew their places of drink. ‘Eat then, and drink from the bounties of Allah and act not corruptly in the earth, spreading mischief.'

(2:61) And when you said: ‘O Musa! We will no longer put up with this monotonous diet.¹⁴⁴ Invoke your Lord, therefore, on our behalf¹⁴⁵ that He may bring forth for us what the earth produces: green herbs, cucumbers, garlic, lentils, onions.' He said: ‘Would you have that which is meaner in exchange of that which is better? Go down to any town,¹⁴⁶ you shall find (therein) what you have asked for.' And humiliation and wretchedness were stamped upon them,¹⁴⁷ and they drew on themselves the wrath of Allah.¹⁴⁸ That because they used to deny Allah's signs and slay¹⁴⁹ (His) Messengers without right.¹⁵⁰ That because they disobeyed¹⁵¹ and were frequently transgressing.¹⁵²

Commentary

143. This event also occurred in the Sinai when the Israelites ran out of water and made demands on Musa (asws) that he pray to his Lord for relief. Musa (asws) supplicated to Allah. He was asked to strike his rod on a specific stone from which sprang out 12 springs so that each of the twelve tribes could draw water from a specific one. It is reported that from then on they carried the stone (according to one version on a donkey which gives some idea of its size) wherever they went, and Musa (asws) would strike it whenever the need arose. The "al" of "hajr" indicates that it was a specific stone. Some have speculated that it was the same stone that had run away with Musa's clothes in the story alluded to in verse 33 of surah al Ahzab (Ibn Jarir, Ibn Kathir, Qurtubi).

No less wondrous, however, was our Prophet's miracle who produced water from flesh and bones. This happened in a campaign when the Muslims numbering about two thousand and five hundred ran out of water. The Prophet (saws) thrust his hand into a pitcher, and water began to gush forth from his fingers (Qurtubi).

144. According to Qatadah and Abu al `Aliyyah, when the Israelites complained of heat and hunger in the Sinai, Allah sent a cloud that remained stretched over them. He also sent them the manna and the quails which they received daily without any exertion on their part. But very soon they were weary of these things and began to hanker for the variety of foods they relished in Egypt. When they began to pester Musa they were told to go and settle into any town where such things are found aplenty (Ibn Jarir).

Majid quotes: "'And the Children of Israel also wept again, and said: Who shall give us flesh to eat? We remember the fish which we did eat in Egypt freely, and the cucumbers, and the melons, and the onions, and the garlic. But now our soul is dried away; there is nothing at all besides this Manna, before our eyes' (Nu.11: 4 6)."

145. Note the words "call on your Lord on our behalf" (ud`u lana) which suggest little personal attachment on the part of the Israelites, to the Lord, their God, who had rescued them from slavery into freedom and showered blessings on them all the way down from Egypt to the Sinai (Au.).

146. Although a variant reading of the original has been "misra" which could be interpreted as the land of Egypt that the Israelites had left behind them, the great majority of scholars have, from the earliest times, read it as "misran" as it also appears in all texts, which leaves no possibility but the rendering as "any town" (misr: pl. amsar: a town, dwelling place). Ibn Jarir reports Qatadah, Suddi, Mujahid and Ibn Zayd of this opinion, and himself quotes another verse (no. 21 of al Ma'idah) which proves that it was any town one of the Syrian region, that was meant. Ibn Kathir reports Ibn `Abbas as also of the opinion that the allusion by the term misran is to any town. Nonetheless, the Orientalists of all times (Sale, Rodwell, Palmer, Bell, N.J.Dawood, Arberry) have preferred to stay unanimous over the rendering as "Egypt," perhaps to prove that the Prophet (whose authorship of the Qur'an they were desperate to prove), erred and thought that the Israelites went back to Egypt something the Old Testament would not agree with. Interestingly though, Rashid Rida has shown that there is evidence that the Israelites might have gone back to Egypt. See note 191 of Surah al A`raf of this work for details (Au.).

147. Majid remarks: "Note that the pronoun 'them' refers to the race of Israel rather than to the Jews as a religious body. Even in the present day anti Semitic agitation (1957), `the Jews are not opposed on account of their religion, but on account of their racial characteristics. As such are mentioned: greed, a special aptitude for money making, aversion to hard work, clannishness and obtrusiveness, lack of social tact, and especially of patriotism. Finally, the term is used to justify resentment for every crime or objectionable act committed by individual Jews' (J.E.I.p. 641)."

Thanwi remarks: This goes to prove that not to be satisfied with what Allah has ordained for a man is a thing displeasing to Allah. Such as, for instance, the case of a man endowed with tawakkul going about hunting to further the means of sustenance, or that of a man giving up an easy source of income already on hand, in search of something better.

148. Majid comments: "In the words of a Christian historian, ‘for ages the Hebrew history has been the same everywhere substantially a constant moan, as it were, with variations indeed, but seldom a note in which we miss the quality of agony.' And a leading Jew of today is said to have exclaimed: 'If there are gradations in suffering, Israel has reached its highest acme.' Certainly, there is no history so full of mournful pathos as theirs. And it is instructive, if also pathetic, to note that in the years 1938 39 with all the wealth and commerce and `influence' at their disposal there are incessant references in their press to their `frightful persecutions' and 'the beatings, the murders, the torture, the robbing, the blackmailing, the arrests and imprisonments' and `humiliations, both public and private' that are being perpetrated on them in several parts of `civilized' Europe."

"Statistics wherever obtainable, show that the proportion of blindness is greater among modern Jews than among their non Jewish neighbors (JE.III, pp.249,250)....As with blindness, Jews...have shown a marked tendency toward deaf mutism in the general proportion, as compared with non Jews, of two to one (IV. p.480). `Among the Jews the proportion of insane has been observed to be very large. From statistics collected by Kushan, he concludes that they are four to six times more liable to mental illness than non Jews' (VI.p.603). `The Jews are more subject to diseases of the nervous system than the other races and peoples among which they dwell. Hysteria and neurasthenia appear to be most frequent. Some physicians of large experience among Jews have even gone so far as to state that most of them are neurasthenic and hysterical. Tobler claims that all the Jewish women in Palestine are hysterical. The Jewish population of that city alone is almost exclusively inexhaustible source for the supply of hysterical males for the clinics of the whole continent' (IX. p.225)."

149. "This passage obviously refers to a later phase of Jewish history. That the Jews actually did kill some of their prophets is evidenced, for instance, in the story of John the Baptist, as well as in the more general accusation uttered, according to the Gospel, by Jesus: "O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, thou that killest the prophets, and stonest them which are sent unto thee" (Matthew xxiii, 37). See also Matthew xxiii, 34 35, Luke xi, 51 both of which refer to the murder of Zachariah and I Thessalonians ii, 15. The implication of continuity in, or persistent repetition of, their wrongdoing transpires from the use of the auxiliary verb kanu in this context" (Asad).

Majid quotes: "'They mocked the messengers of God, and despised his words and misused his prophets, until the wrath of the Lord arose against his people, till there was no remedy.' (2 Ch. 36:16) `Wherefore, will ye plead with me? Ye have all transgressed against me, saith the Lord ... Your own sword hath devoured prophets, like a destroying lion.' (Je. 2:30) `They were disobedient and rebelled against thee, and cast thy law behind their backs and slew thy prophets.' (Ne. 9:26).' ... `Ye are the children of those which killed the prophets.. Fill ye up then the measures of your father. Ye serpents, ye generation of vipers, how can ye escape the damnation of hell? Wherefore, behold, I send unto you prophets, and wise men and scribes: and some of them ye shall kill and crucify: and some of them shall ye scourge in your synagogues and persecute them from city to city: That upon you may come all the righteous bloodshed upon the earth from the blood of righteous Abel unto the blood of Zacharias, son of Barchias, whom ye slew between the temple and the altar (Mt. 23:31 35)."

Imam Ahmad reports Ibn Mas`ud as having said that the Prophet said: « أَشَدُّ النَّاسِ عَذَاباً يَوْمَ الْقِيَامَةِ رَجُلٌ قَتَلَهُ نَبِىٌّ أَوْ قَتَلَ نَبِيًّا وَإِمَامُ ضَلاَلَةٍ وَمُمَثِّلٌ مِنَ الْمُمَثِّلِينَ » "The most severely punished on the day of Judgment would be, (a) a man who was killed by a Prophet, (b) a man who killed a Prophet, (c) a leader who misled his people, and, (d) the sculptor" (Ibn Kathir). The second part of the above hadith is in the Sahihayn also, but the first part is declared weak by Haythami (Au.).

150. "I.e., wrongful and unjust not only in the sight of God, as the murder of a prophet in any instance is bound to be, but wrongful, unjust and illegal, even according to Israel's own code of law and justice. To take the case of Jesus: He 'was not condemned but he was slain. His martyrdom was no miscarriage of justice, it was a murder' (Rosadi, Trial of Jesus, p.301). 'In this trial was a violence done to the forms and rules of Hebrew as well as to the principles of justice.' (Innes, Trial of Jesus Christ, p.35)" Majid.

151. "For the uniformly rebellious attitude of Israel towards their greatest leader and benefactor, Prophet Moses, compare and consult their national historian Josephus: 'They were very angry at their conductor Moses and were zealous in their attempt to stone him as the direct occasion of their present miseries.' ("And." III. 1:3) '... the multitude were irritated and bitterly set against him.' (1:4) `They again turned their anger against Moses, but he at first avoided the fury of the multitude...' (1:7) `The multitude began again to be mutinous and blame Moses for the misfortunes they had suffered in their travels.' (13:1) 'The multitude therefore became still more unruly and more mutinous against Moses than before.' And Moses 'was abused by them.' (13:1) 'They again blamed Moses and made a clamor against him and his brother Aaron ... They passed that night very ill and with contumacious language against them: but in the morning they ran to a congregation intending to stone Moses and Aaron, and so to return to Egypt.' (14:3) '... notwithstanding the indignities they had offered their legislator and the laws and their disobedience to the commandments which He had sent them by Moses.' (IV. 2:1) `When forty years were completed, Moses gathered the congregation together near Jordan ... and all the people being come together he spoke thus to them: .... `you know that I have been oftener in danger of death from you than from our enemies' (8: 1 2)" Majid.

152. "The Bible abounds in doleful narratives of their rebellion and revolt. To give only a few such extracts out of many: 'Remember and forget not, how thou provoked the Lord thy God to wrath in the wilderness; from the day thou didst depart out of the land of Egypt, until ye came unto this place, ye have been rebellious against the Lord. Also in Horab ye provoked the Lord to wrath, so that the Lord was angry with you to have destroyed you. When I was gone up in the Mount to receive the tablets of stone ... the Lord said unto me: ... thy people which thou hast brought forth out of Egypt have corrupted themselves; they are quickly turned aside out of the way which I commanded them; they have made them a molten image. Furthermore the Lord spake unto me, saying, I have seen this people, and behold, it is a stiff necked people. Let me alone, that I may destroy them and blot out their name from under heaven.' (Dt. 9: 7 13) 'Ye rebelled against the commandment of the Lord, your God, and ye believed him not, nor hearkened to his voice. Ye have been rebellious against the Lord from the day that I know you.' (23 24) 'I know thy rebellion, and thy stiff neck: behold, while I (Moses) am yet alive with you this day, ye have been rebellious against the Lord; and how much more after my death? ... I know that after my death ye will utterly corrupt yourselves and turn aside from the way which I have commanded you and evil will befall you in the latter days: because ye will do evil in the sight of the Lord, to provoke him to anger through the work of your hands' (31: 27 29)" Majid.