وَقَالَ ٱلَّذِى نَجَا مِنْهُمَا وَٱدَّكَرَ بَعْدَ أُمَّةٍ أَنَا۠ أُنَبِّئُكُم بِتَأْوِيلِهِۦ فَأَرْسِلُونِ · يُوسُفُ أَيُّهَا ٱلصِّدِّيقُ أَفْتِنَا … قَالَ تَزْرَعُونَ سَبْعَ سِنِينَ دَأَبًا فَمَا حَصَدتُّمْ فَذَرُوهُ فِى سُنۢبُلِهِۦٓ إِلَّا قَلِيلًا مِّمَّا تَأْكُلُونَ
"The one of the two who had been saved remembered after a long while and said: 'I will tell you its interpretation; send me forth.' — 'Joseph! You man of truth! Give us a ruling on seven fat cows being eaten by seven lean ones, and seven green ears of grain and seven others dry, that I may return to the people and they may know.' He said: 'You will sow for seven years as you are used to. What you reap, leave in the ear, save a little that you eat. Then after that will come seven hard years, which will consume what you laid up for them — save a little that you keep in store. Then after that will come a year in which the people will be given abundant rain, and in which they will press.'"
ٱدَّكَرَ — root ذ-ك-ر, Form VIII. Its original form is idhdakara; the dhāl and the dāl have merged to give iddakara. This is a known rule of assimilation in Arabic.
أُمَّة — the word occurs in the Qurʾān in several senses, and here it means a stretch of time: "after a while". The same word could in another context have carried the sense of a community; the Qurʾān uses this word in the sense of time at Hūd 11/8 as well (ilā ummatin maʿdūda).
And the length of the forgetting is worth recording: in verse 42 it was said fa-ansāhu'sh-shayṭān; here baʿda umma. That is, the forgetting is not a mere moment but a long stretch.
صِدِّيق — root ص-د-ق, an intensive form (fiʿʿīl): one in whom truthfulness has become a settled disposition.
The word was treated at al-Ḥadīd 57/19 (wa'lladhīna āmanū bi'llāhi wa-rusulihi ulāʾika humu'ṣ-ṣiddīqūn), and those named with this attribute in the Qurʾān were listed there:
The Qurʾān uses this word of several persons: Abraham (Maryam 19/41), Idrīs (Maryam 19/56), Joseph (Yūsuf 12/46 — there as a form of address), and Mary (al-Māʾida 5/75).
And who makes the address is worth recording: the one who uses the word is the man who shared the prison with him and parted from him years before. That is, the attribute rests on an observation made long ago.
And this is one of the most concrete points of the sūra. What was asked for was an interpretation of a dream; the answer given consists of three parts, and only the first is an interpretation:
| Part | Verse | What |
|---|---|---|
| 1. The interpretation | 47-48 | Seven years of plenty, seven of famine |
| 2. The application | 47 | Fa-mā ḥaṣadtum fa-dharūhu fī sunbulih — leave it in the ear |
| 3. The surplus | 49 | A year that is not in the interpretation — a year of plenty and of pressing |
I record this as my own reading, and its ground is the text of verse 43: the dream the king saw contains fourteen elements (seven + seven cows, seven + seven ears). The year in the forty-ninth verse is not in the dream.
That is, the answer exceeds what was asked. And a link with the sūra's key construction can be made: taʾwīlu'l-aḥādīth — to know where events arrive. The dream ends in the seventh year; taʾwīl shows the fifteenth as well.
This is information verifiable from the history of agriculture, and I transmit it as an observation: grain kept without being separated from the ear has the natural protection of its outer husk; it is more resistant to damp and to insects. This method has been used throughout history for long-term storage.
I give this as a piece of information; I am not dressing the verse in a modern one. What the verse states is a technique, and the ground of the technique is not written in the text.
دَأَبًا — root د-أ-ب: to do a thing continuously and with effort; a habitual practice. Ka-daʾbi āli Firʿawn (Āl ʿImrān 3/11) — "like the wont of Pharaoh's folk". The sense here: "after your custom of every year, without a break."
The answer is not a prophecy but a policy. It contains the following: production (seven years of sowing), a limit on consumption (illā qalīlan mimmā taʾkulūn), a method of storage (leaving it in the ear), and stock management (illā qalīlan mimmā tuḥṣinūn — setting aside seed grain).
That is, the knowledge is given already converted into a practice. And this lays the ground for the request in the next block (ijʿalnī ʿalā khazāʾini'l-arḍ, 55): the request for office comes after a plan has been set out.
يُغَاثُ ٱلنَّاسُ — root غ-و-ث (help) or غ-ي-ث (rain). The lexicographers record both derivations, and on either the meaning comes to the same place: the lifting of hardship. I transmit the disagreement; I do not impose a preference.
وَفِيهِ يَعْصِرُون — and the verb is the same as the verb of the dream in verse 36: aʿṣiru. The section that began in prison with the verb of pressing ends with the verb of pressing in the year of plenty. This is a countable overlap within the sūra.