Joseph (Yusuf)

Commentary

(a) At the time of departure of Joseph’s brothers, Joseph out of kindness put his drinking cup (which was perhaps made of silver) in his brother Benjamin’s possessions. This was not known to Benjamin or to the courtiers. Thereafter, by the will of God, it happened that the royal measure for measuring the corn (which was also perhaps very costly) was misplaced somewhere. When the royal servants did not find it after making a search, they suspected Joseph’s brothers who had left just then. One of the officials called back the caravan. In the course of inquiries they themselves (Joseph’s brothers) suggested as a punishment for theft (which was prevalent among them), according to the law of Abraham, that the thief himself should remain with the owner for a year as a slave. ( a )Joseph did not want his younger brother to depart. When Benjamin’s packs were being readied, Joseph put his drinking cup in his younger brother’s packs. This was no malicious subterfuge on the part of Joseph, but was done out of great affection for his younger brother. Previously Joseph had done something similar when he put all the money which they had brought to buy grain in his brothers’ packs. The brothers only realized it when they opened their packs once they were back home. This time too, as a gesture of affection and love to his brother, he put his drinking cup in his younger brother’s pack. This was neither known to Benjamin nor to the courtiers. In the meantime, the weighing cup of the king had been misplaced and the courtiers suspected Joseph’s brothers of stealing it. When they opened their packs, they found Joseph’s drinking cup in Benjamin’s bag. This was not the cup they were looking for, but it was a similar one. The difference in these two cups can be understood by the two different words used for them in the Quran. The drinking cup belonging to Joseph is called siqayah, while the royal measuring bowl is called suwa‘ (verse 72). The cup which was recovered from Benjamin’s bag was a siqayah not a suwa‘, as a feminine pronoun, ‘ha’ (istakhrajaha) used for the cup here refers to the drinking cup of Joseph, and not to the lost measuring bowl of the king. This was not, therefore, a trick on the part of Joseph to prevent his brother from leaving, but in the words of Quran, it was an inspiration from God: ‘We devised a plan on behalf of Joseph’. In this instance, if the law of the king of Egypt had been observed, Benjamin would not have been given into the custody of Joseph but would instead have been beaten and the cost of the stolen item recovered from him, for that was the punishment regularly meted out to thieves. This incident did not come about by Joseph’s intention. It happened due to divine arrangement: God attributed it to Himself, ‘We devised a plan on behalf of Joseph’ (kazalika kidna li yusufa).