ভূমিকা

And verily We sent Moses with Our Ayat (Verses, Signs) and a manifest authority. 24. To Pharaoh, Haman, and Korah, but they called [him] a sorcerer, a liar. 25. Then when he brought them the Truth from Us, they said: “Slay the sons of those who believe with him and let their women live” but [they knew not that] the plots of disbelievers are nothing but in vain. Messengers had two weapons of significance against tyrants: the miracle of Divine Ayat and manifest authority.

Prophetic missions mainly aim at struggling with the chiefs of corruption and disbelief who make use of force, government, political power, stratagems, mischief, cultural power, worldly possessions, and economic power. Resuming the allusion to the dire fate of ancient peoples in the preceding Verses, the verses in question alludes to the story of Pharaoh, Haman, and Korah.

Verses 23 and 24 say: “We sent Moses with our Ayat and manifest authority to Pharaoh, Haman, and Korah, but they said: ‘He is a lying sorcerer.’” Different interpretations have been produced by Qur’anic exegets as to the difference between Ayat and manifest authority. Some maintain that the former and the latter refer to manifest arguments and miracles respectively.

Some maintain that the former indicates all of Moses’ miracles whereas the latter designate his prominent miracles such as his walking stick and illuminating hand which led to his manifest dominance over Pharaoh. Thus, Ayat refers to his miracles and manifest authority designates his solid and decisive arguments against the people of Pharaoh.

It is worthy of note that Moses possessed intellectual arguments and also wrought miracles which demonstrated his nexus with the supernatural; however, the stance of the people of Pharaoh was that they accused him of being a liar and a sorcerer. They made use of such accusations against Ayat and miracles and disbelieved him against his logical arguments. It bears another testimony to the acceptability of the two interpretations in question.