Yusuf · Makki · ayah 71 of 111

Yusuf 12:71

قَالُوا۟ وَأَقْبَلُوا۟ عَلَيْهِم مَّاذَا تَفْقِدُونَ

“They said while approaching them, "What is it you are missing?"”

Saheeh International

Essence

Accused on the road, the brothers turn to face their accusers and ask what is missing, the very question their bereaved father could have answered.

A reflection

Not a link in the plot: the posture of the innocent

This is one of the shortest ayat in the passage, and most readers pass straight through it. A line of dialogue, a link between the accusation and the search.

But it shows something the brothers have never shown before.

The last time these men faced an accusation of sorts, it was their father's silent question about Yusuf. They came home at nightfall, the surah says, weeping. With a shirt, false blood and a prepared story.

Now they are accused openly, on a road, by strangers with authority. And they do not weep, or run, or produce a story. They turn round. They face the men. And they ask a plain question.

What is it you are missing?

One modern commentary fills in the tone: what have you lost, that you accuse us of theft? It is the response of people who know they have not done this.

A cyclist is flagged down by a police officer on a bridge. He gets off, wheels the bike to the kerb, turns to face her and asks what has happened. He has not done anything, and his body knows it before his mind has finished thinking.

Guilt tends to turn away, explain too much, or attack. Innocence tends to turn towards, and ask.

The ayah captures that in four words of Arabic. For once, these brothers are standing in the truth, and it shows in how they stand.

The reader, who knows the cup is in Binyamin's sack, watches them with a strange mixture of feelings. They are innocent of this. And their innocence of this makes their old guilt visible by contrast.

The full entry has 5 more reflections, questions to sit with, and "Live it today" - with the words, the roots and the tafsir alongside. Free, no account, works offline.