"When he reached his full strength" — twin verses on Joseph and Moses
وَلَمَّا بَلَغَ أَشُدَّهُۥٓ ءَاتَيْنَٰهُ حُكْمًا وَعِلْمًا وَكَذَٰلِكَ نَجْزِى ٱلْمُحْسِنِينَ
wa-lammā balagha ashuddahu ātaynāhu ḥukman wa-ʿilman wa-kadhālika najzī l-muḥsinīn — And when he reached his full strength, We granted him wise judgment and knowledge; and thus We recompense the ones who excel in doing good.
Two verses, one about Joseph (12:22) and one about Moses (28:14), share this sentence word for word, except that 28:14 adds wa-stawā ("and became well-formed") after "his full strength," extending the description of physical maturity before the gift of ḥukm and ʿilm.
The two verses are identical in Arabic except for one added word: 28:14 inserts وَٱسْتَوَىٰ, a Form VIII perfect verb, third masculine singular ("and became well-formed"), between "reached his full strength" and "We granted him." In 12:22 the sequence runs directly from reaching full strength to the grant of ḥukm and ʿilm, followed by the closing formula "and thus We recompense..." In 28:14 the added verb makes the maturing two-staged: reaching full strength, then becoming well-formed, and only then the grant. The surrounding contexts differ in what precedes the grant. In 12:21 the verse about Joseph is preceded by his being bought in Egypt and by "We established Joseph in the land, and so that We might teach him from the returning of the accounts" — a stated purpose of teaching that anticipates the ʿilm granted in 12:22. In 28:13 the verse about Moses is preceded by his return to his mother "so that her eye might become settled," and 28:14's grant is followed immediately by his entering the city and the incident of the two fighting men (28:15), where the granted ḥukm is immediately at stake in his judgment of his own act. Both verses close with the same recompense clause, whose Arabic is identical; our translation renders the participle ٱلْمُحْسِنِينَ slightly differently ("the ones who excel in doing good" / "the doers of good"), but the Arabic does not differ. The single added word in 28:14 thus does the only distinguishing work between the twins.
Where it occurs
- 12:22 Marks Joseph's reaching of full strength as the point at which he is granted ḥukm and ʿilm, closing with the recompense formula.
- 28:14 Marks Moses' reaching of full strength, with the added wa-stawā, as the point of the same grant, immediately before his entry into the city in 28:15.
All Qur'anic expressions