2/60 — Twelve springs
"Moses asked for water for his people. We said, 'Strike the rock with your staff.' Twelve springs gushed out of it; each tribe knew its own drinking place."
The detail matters: the number of springs is twelve, and the number of tribes is twelve too. The water flows not from one place but from a mouth belonging to each community.
This is a measure of governance set inside the miracle. Had there been a single source in a waterless desert, the source would itself have become a cause of conflict — a fight over turns, over precedence, over control. At the same time as the water is given, the quarrel that would arise from sharing the water is solved.
What the Qurʾān records here is that meeting the need is not enough on its own: a favour given without an order of sharing is a source of new trouble.