85. 'Pharaoh' literally means 'the offspring of the sun-god'. The ancient
Egyptians called the sun 'Ra', worshipped it as their supreme deity', and Pharaoh
- Ra's physical manifestation and representative - was named after it. It was
for this reason that all Egyptian rulers claimed their authority on the basis
of their association with Ra, and every ruler who mounted the Egyptian throne
called himself Pharaoh, trying thereby to assure his people that he was their
supreme deity.
It may be noted that the Qur'anic narrative regarding Moses refers to two Pharaohs.
The first of these was one during whose reign Moses was born and in whose palace
he was brought up. The second Pharaoh to Whorn reference is made is the one
whom Moses invited to Islam and who was asked to liberate the Israelites. It
is this latter Pharaoh who was finally drowned. Modern scholarship is inclined
to the view that the first Pharaoh was Rameses 11 who ruled over Egypt from
1292 B.C. to 1225 B.C. while the second Pharaoh was Minpetah, his son, who had
become a co-sharer in his father's authority during the latter's lifetime and
who, after his death, became the fully-fledged ruler of Egypt. This, however,
is not fully established since Moses, according to the Egyptian calendar, died
in 1272 B.C. In any case these are merely historical conjectures. It is quite
difficult to establish a clear chronological framework owing to discrepancies
in the Egyptian, Israeli and Christian calendars.
86. Moses was sent to Pharaoh to invite him to two things; first, to surrender himself to God (i.e. Islam); and second, to release the Israelites - who were already Muslims - from his oppressive bondage. The Qur'an refers occasionally to both these objectives, and occasionally confines itself to mentioning either of the two.