وَقالَ الَّذِي اشتَراهُ مِن مِصرَ لِامرَأَتِهِ أَكرِمي مَثواهُ
عَسىٰ أَن يَنفَعَنا أَو نَتَّخِذَهُ وَلَدًا ۚ وَكَذٰلِكَ مَكَّنّا لِيوسُفَ فِي الأَرضِ
وَلِنُعَلِّمَهُ مِن تَأويلِ الأَحاديثِ ۚ وَاللَّهُ غالِبٌ عَلىٰ أَمرِهِ
وَلٰكِنَّ أَكثَرَ النّاسِ لا يَعلَمونَ
“The
Egyptian who had bought him told his wife, ‘Look after him with honour and
respect. It’s possible he will be of use to us or perhaps we might adopt him as
a son.’ And thus We established Yusuf in the land to teach him the true meaning
of events. Allah is in control of His affair. However, most of mankind do
not know.” [Quran 12: 21]
The story of Sayyidina Yusof is
the most beautiful of all the prophetic stories in the Quran, not least because
it is the only story told from start to finish coherently in a single surah
namely surah Yusof. There are many gems to be learnt from this story but we
will focus on one theme of this surah, which is perhaps the main theme, namely Allah
is in complete control of all the things that occur in our lives and that He works
in the most subtle of ways, often beyond our wildest imagination.
The prophet Yusof (PBUH)
underwent a multitude of trials in his life from the time he was a child all
the way until he was released from prison in Egypt. The most painful of these
tribulations were most likely to be how his own brothers treated him. They were
jealous of him because they felt their father, Sayydina Ya’kub, loved him more
than them. As a result they plotted to kill him, but decided to commit a lesser
evil by throwing him, at the time only about 6 or 7 years old, into a deep
abandoned well, hoping some caravan would pick him up and take him to a faraway
land from where he would never come back. He was then picked up by a caravan
and sold as a slave for a miserable price to a minister in Egypt, hundreds of miles
away from his home in Palestine (Canaan). He grew up in the house of the
minister into a supremely handsome young man. He was so handsome that the wife
of the minister fell in love and flirted with him. When he refused to reciprocate,
she together with her lady friends who also lusted for him (they were so
consumed by his handsomeness that they cut their hands while they were slicing
fruits when they saw him pass them by during a banquiet held in the minister's house) plotted to put him in jail and they
succeeded. He stayed in jail for a long time until the king of Egypt released
him because he managed to interpret the king’s dream. When he took charge of
the storehouses of the land, he managed to save food not just for the people of
Egypt but also for the people of neighbouring lands. This then lead to his
brothers coming to get food from him and after the discovery that Yusof (PBUH)
was still alive, Allah reunited the whole family in Egypt, after at least 30
long years of separation.
This story is so amazing because
although Sayyidina Yusof suffered the evil plots of people including his own
brothers throughout his life, all of those plots resided within the grand plan
of Allah for him. In fact, it is because of their plots that he became what he
became. The evil ones plotted, intending evil for Yusof (PBUH), but Allah
plotted too, and in the end, their evil plots only served to fulfill the grand
design that Allah had for Yusof (PBUH). He could have
never guessed the beautiful end of all the suffering he faced,
but such is the subtlety with which Allah works. The important thing is for us to
realize that Allah is in complete control of everything that happens in the
universe, and that He executes His grand plan with absolute subtlety. It is we
who must be patient in times of difficulty and never lose hope, but instead
place out trust in Allah, in Whose Hand rests the decree of all matters. Hence
the words of Sayyidina Yusof when Allah reunited him with his family in Egypt:
وَرَفَعَ أَبَوَيهِ عَلَى العَرشِ وَخَرّوا لَهُ سُجَّدًا ۖ وَقالَ يا
أَبَتِ هٰذا تَأويلُ رُؤيايَ مِن قَبلُ قَد جَعَلَها رَبّي حَقًّا ۖ وَقَد أَحسَنَ
بي إِذ أَخرَجَني مِنَ السِّجنِ وَجاءَ بِكُم مِنَ البَدوِ مِن بَعدِ أَن نَزَغَ
الشَّيطانُ بَيني وَبَينَ إِخوَتي ۚ إِنَّ رَبّي لَطيفٌ لِما يَشاءُ ۚ إِنَّهُ
هُوَ العَليمُ الحَكيمُ
“And
he raised his parents upon the throne, and they bowed to him in prostration.
And he said, "O my father, this is the explanation of my vision of before.
My Lord has made it reality. And He was certainly good to me when He took me
out of prison and brought you [here] from bedouin life after Satan had induced
[estrangement] between me and my brothers. Indeed, my Lord is Subtle in what
He wills. Indeed, it is He who is the Knowing, the Wise. “
[Quran
12: 100]
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