ভূমিকা

"And (remember) when We delivered you from the people of Pharaoh who had afflicted you with evil torment, slaughtering your sons and sparing your women-folk, and in that was a great trial from your Lord. " : In this verse, the Qur'an points to another great bounty out of the bounties He bestowed on the Children of Israel. This favour is the bounty of deliverance from the grips of those transgressors.

This is the greatest bounty amongst the bounties of Allah on them and He reminds them, saying: "And (remember) when We delivered you from the people of Pharaoh..." "... who had afflicted you with evil torment... " "... slaughtering your sons and sparing your women-folk... " They let your women-folk live as maid-servants and serve hard for them.

"...and in that was a great trial from your Lord." To illustrate the torments of Pharaoh upon the Israelites, the Qur'an has particularly applied the term / yasumuna / in the future tense of the verb, which, in Arabic, indicates the duration and continuity of that evil torment. Thus, they saw for themselves that their innocent sons were slaughtered before their eyes and their daughters were taken away from them to serve in the Egyptians' houses as maid-servants.

That conduct caused them to tolerate and experience torture permanently, too. They were considered as servants, workers, and slaves of the Coptic people in Egypt and of the men of Pharaoh. It is a matter of importance that the Qur'an counts this event as a great and grievous trial for the Children of Israel and, of course, bearing all those bitter harsh afflictions had been a hard tremendous trial.

It is also probable that the term / bala' / ' trial', here, has been used with the meaning of 'punishment'. The reason is that before that event, Israelites had been enjoying an abundance of bounties with great power and authority. But they became ungrateful and the Lord punished them.

Anyhow, the day when the Children of Israel were delivered from the tyrannical clutches of the Egyptian monarch, the Pharaoh, was a very important historical day in their lives on which the Holy Qur'an has emphasized repeatedly.