“Then, when he provided them with their provisions, he put the drinking cup into his brother’s saddle-bag. Then a herald shouted: ‘O you men of the caravan! You are certainly thieves!’”
Tafseer
“When he prepared their provisions…”
Allah ‘azza wa jall mentions this, and we understand that another transaction has taken place.
They brought forth more goods. This is the second time they are coming to Egypt, and there will be a third time.
This is the second time they are coming for more goods. They purchased grain, and they purchased eleven camel loads. For every man, they get one camel.
“…he put the siqaayah…”( Bowl)
What is a siqaayah? There are many interpretations of what the siqaayah is.
One interpretation says that it is the bowl of the king. A more accurate interpretation is that this was the bowl that was used to weight the grain,
and it was a precious bowl that the king had given, and it was a symbolic bowl that shows the power of the king that ‘we are giving the grain to the people.’
This is the measuring bowl how the grain is measured when you put it into the sack, and so they are seeing something very expensive in front of them.
It is the easy thing for them to hide because the sacks are being filled with this bowl.
This seems to be the stronger interpretation.
All the scholars agree that it is an expensive bowl. , and that is why it was a big deal that was raised when it was stolen.
It is also a symbolic bowl; it was the bowl that shows Egypt has grain and the rest of the nations don’t have grain.
This is the bowl that is used to put the grain when any merchant and any visitor come.
You can imagine that it must be a bowl that will carry a lot of grain, and it has emblems, decorations, and symbols on it. It is, if you like, a national icon.
“He put the siqaayah.”
It is in the singular form. Yusuf did this, and he is the one doing the plan because he doesn’t want to tell.
Even his servants don’t know the full plan. He put the bowl or the measuring cup in the portion of his brother.
Oh yah, I did not even thought of that
One interpretation is that Yusuf told the crier to accuse them of being thieves because they had stolen Yusuf from Ya‘qub and they are kidnappers.
They are thieves because they had taken a property that was not theirs – and that was Yusuf – and they had taken him away from the one whom he belongs to, and that is his father.
And that is exactly what a thief does, so there is no lying at all. They are all thieves.
Another interpretation is that Yusuf used a language that is appropriate, so he said, “The bowl has gone missing, and the last people to do a transaction are that caravan of the Canaanites.”
Canaan is the ancient name of Filitine
It is factual. It is missing because nobody can see it, and the last group is this group. By the time it reaches down the chain of command and the crier comes out, in his mind these are the thieves.
*Reflection *
When they load up the provision on the camel, Yusuf takes the goblet of the king (something that’s very valuable) and put it in the load of Ben Yamin
‣ They’re about to leave and are headed towards the gate
‣ All 11 brothers are about to return to Palestine, and then it’s found out that the goblet of
the king is lost
‣ The only people who have been in the area are the brothers of Prophet Yusuf
‣ A caller is sent out and said “O people of the caravan, indeed you guys are thieves.”
‣ If they were truly thieves, they would take off
• They don’t do that because they know they didn’t steal anything.
*Lesson*;
1. Sometimes deception is needed to achieve good and to protect yourself from an enemy.
This whole scenario of hiding the drinking cup in Binyamin’s bag and then accusing him of theft was deception.
But as we see from the ayah it was needed in order to keep Binyamin in Egypt.
It was needed in order to achieve the good of taking Binyamin away from the brothers who were oppressing him, and also for the greater good of bringing the children of Israil to Egypt.
Remember that all of this was eventually a part of Allah’s plan.
2)If one does not want another person to be aware of something one has or something one intends to do,
one should use a subtle means of distraction that does not contain any lies.
As Yusuf did when he put the golden bowl into his brother’s bag, and he then took the golden bowl out of his brother’s bag leading them think that their brother is the one who stole it.
After which he said, “Allah forbid, that we should take anyone but him with whom we found our property.”
Notice he did not say, “We found our property with him”, or “He stole our property.”
Rather, he made a general statement that can apply to this situation as well as others, and there is not wrong with what he did.
For all he did was made them think that their brother stole the golden bowl, so that his youngest brother can remain with him, as was objective.