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fa-lammā jāʾathum ʾāyātunā mubṣiratan qālū hādhā siḥrun mubīnun
But when Our signs came to them, as eye-openers, they said, ‘This is plain magic.’
— Ali Quli Qarai
27An-NamlالنملVerse 13 of 93
The Ant27. An-Namlالنمل
Al Naml
The Ants
MeccanVerse 13 of 93
Surah An-Naml - Verses 12-13
12. “And put your hand in your bosom, and it will come forth white (shining) without harm, (this miracle is) among the nine signs to Pharaoh and his people; verily they are a transgressing people.”
13. “So when Our clear signs came to them, they said: ‘This is a manifest sorcery’.”
These nine signs or miracles are the miracles that Moses (as) brought before Pharaoh, else he (as) had some other miracles, too. By the way his every miracle can be counted two miracles, because when his Rod became a serpent, it was one miracle, and when the serpent changed back into Rod, it was another miracle, but the Qur’an has considered one side of it a miracle. Moses’ nine miracles are as follows: 1- The white hand (or the shining of the hand of Moses).
2- Conversion of the Rod into a giant serpent. 3- The violent storm for the enemy. 4- Locust (which dominated their farms and their trees) 5- One plant-pest agent which exterminated cereals, called in Arabic /qummal/.
6. The forges which emerged from the Nile River and made people’s lives miserable and full of difficulties.
7. Nose-bleeding or ‘blood’ which signifies the universal counteraction of nose bleeding or the turning of the Nile into the colour blood14
8. Famine and draught15
9. The splitting of the sea16
Other miracles of Moses (as) are: the gushing of 12 springs from stone17, the descending of /mann/ and /salwa/18 Imam Sadiq (as) said:
“The purpose of /min qayri su’/ (without harm) it that this whiteness of the hand was not because of sickness of leprosy. 19
Anyhow, the second miracle of Moses (as) was given to him, as the verse says:
This whiteness of hand which is an interesting shining and luminosity, and not as the result of leprosy, itself denotes to the existence of a miracle and an extraordinary event. In order to grant some more grace to Moses and give further possibility to deviated persons to be guided, the Qur’an, implicitly says to Moses (as) that his miracles are not limited to these two ones, but:
You are sent to Pharaoh and his people equipped with these nine miracles, as well as other great ones, because they are a transgressing people and they need guidance. From the apparent of this verse, it is understood that these two miracles have been among nine known miracles of Moses (as). In commenting on Surah Al-’Isra’, No. 17, verse 101 it was concluded before that there are seven other miracles for Moses, five of which are: storm, plant-pests, locusts, forges, and turning of the Nile water into the colour of blood.
When each of these events came to Pharaohs as a warning and they encountered with some difficulty, they used to come to Moses and asked him to remove the pest. There were two more miracles: draught and scanty of fruits, which are mentioned in Surah Al-’A‘raf, No. 7, verse 130. It says:
At last, Moses was equipped with the strongest weapon of miracle and went towards Pharaoh and his people. He invited them to the religion of truth. The Qur’an says:
We know that this accusation was not charged only on Moses (as) but, in order to adjust their oppositions against prophets, and in order that they produce a barrier in the way of others, the arrogant fanatic people brought forth the accusation of sorcery for the prophets which itself is a clear sign for the greatness of their extraordinary work. It is in the case that we know that prophets are some pure, pious and truth-seeking men, while sorcerers are some deviated and corrupted persons and are qualified with all qualities that a deceitful one may have.
Moreover, sorcerers had always been able to do some limited affairs, but prophets, whose customs and the content of their godly invitations made their legitimacy manifest, had no similarity to sorcerers.
Footnotes