Surah Al-Araf, Verse 103 and 104

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*Surah Al-Araf, Verse 103:*

ثُمَّ بَعَثْنَا مِن بَعْدِهِم مُّوسَىٰ بِآيَاتِنَا إِلَىٰ فِرْعَوْنَ وَمَلَئِهِ فَظَلَمُوا بِهَا فَانظُرْ كَيْفَ كَانَ عَاقِبَةُ الْمُفْسِدِينَ

Then after them We sent Musa (Moses) with Our Signs to Fir'aun (Pharaoh) and his chiefs, but they wrongfully rejected them. So see how was the end of the Mufsidun (mischief-makers, corrupts, etc.). 

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*Surah Al-Araf, Verse 104:*

وَقَالَ مُوسَىٰ يَا فِرْعَوْنُ إِنِّي رَسُولٌ مِّن رَّبِّ الْعَالَمِينَ

And Musa (Moses) said: "O Fir'aun (Pharaoh)! I am a Messenger from the Lord of the 'Alamin (mankind, jinns and all that exists).

#COMMENTARY

The story of Moses is told in many places in the Holy Qur-ān, with a special lesson in each context. In Sūra Al-Baqara, verses 49-71, the story is an appeal to the Jews from their own scripture and traditions, to show their true place in the religious history of mankind, and how they forfeited it. Here we have an instructive parallelism in that story to the story of Prophet Muhammad's mission, -how both these men of Almighty ALLĀH had to fight against:

1. A foreign foe, arrogant, unjust, faithless, and superstitious, and 

2. Against the same class of internal foe among their own people. 

Both of them won through. In the case of Moses, the foreign foe was Pharaoh and his Egyptians, who boasted of their earlier and superior civilisation; in the case of the Prophet Muhammad (Blessings and Peace of ALLĀH be upon him) the foreign foes were the Jews themselves and the Christians of his day. Moses led his people nearly to the Land of promise in spite of rebellions among his own people; Prophet Muhammad succeeded completely in overcoming the resistance of his own people by his own virtues and firmness of character, and by the guidance of Almighty ALLĀH (Sub-haanahu wata'aala). What was a hope when these Makkan verses were revealed became an accomplishment before the end of his life and mission on earth.

"Pharaoh" (Arabic, Fir'aun) is a dynastic title, not the name of any particular king in Egypt. It has been traced to the ancient Hieroglyphic word, per-āa, which mean "Great House." The nūn is an "infirm" letter added in the process of Arabisation. Who was the Pharaoh in the story of Moses? If the Inscriptions had helped us, we could have answered with some confidence, but unfortunately the Inscriptions fail us. It is probable that it was an early Pharaoh of the XVIIIth Dynasty, say Thothmes I, about 1540 B.C.