English Translation

Abdullah ibn Ibrahim al-Marwazi told us, he said: Hisham ibn Yusuf told me, in the exegesis of Ibn Jurayj which he dictated to them: Ya'la ibn Muslim and Amr ibn Dinar informed me, from Sa'id ibn Jubayr — one of them adding more than the other, and others besides them; he said he had heard it narrated from Sa'id ibn Jubayr — who said: We were with Abdullah ibn Abbas in his house when he said: "Ask me." I said: "Abu Abbas, may Allah make me a ransom for you, in Kufa there is a storyteller called Nawf who claims that he — the one Musa followed — is not the Musa of the Children of Israel." As for Amr ibn Dinar, he said: "The enemy of Allah has lied." As for Ya'la ibn Muslim, he said Ibn Abbas said: "Ubayy ibn Ka'b told me: The Messenger of Allah, peace and blessings be upon him, said: 'Musa, the Messenger of Allah, peace be upon him, reminded the people one day until eyes overflowed with tears and hearts softened, then he turned away. A man caught up with him and said: "O Messenger of Allah, is there anyone on earth more knowledgeable than you?" He said: "No."' He was reproached for not attributing the knowledge back to Allah, blessed and exalted. So Allah revealed to him: 'I have a servant more knowledgeable than you.' He said: 'My Lord, and where?' He said: 'At the junction of the two seas.' He said: 'My Lord, give me a sign by which I will know that.'" Amr told me he said: "Where the fish leaves you." And Ya'la said: "Take a dead fish, at the place where the spirit is breathed into it." So he took a fish and put it in a basket. He said to his young companion: "I only ask of you that you tell me where the fish leaves you." He said: "You have not asked much of me." That is the meaning of His saying, blessed and exalted: "When Musa said to his young companion" — Yusha ibn Nun; this is not from Sa'id ibn Jubayr — he said: While he was in the shade of a rock in a moist place, the fish stirred while Musa was asleep. His young companion said: "I will not wake him" — and when he woke, he forgot to tell him — and the fish stirred until it entered the sea. Allah, blessed and exalted, held back the flow of the sea over it until its track was as if in stone. Amr told me: "as if its track was in stone," and he formed a circle with his two thumbs and the fingers next to them. "We have certainly suffered exhaustion from this journey of ours." He said: "Allah, blessed and exalted, has already relieved you of exhaustion" — this is not from Sa'id ibn Jubayr — so he told him, and they went back and found al-Khidr, peace be upon him. Uthman ibn Abi Sulayman told me: "upon a green carpet on the surface of the sea." Sa'id ibn Jubayr said: "wrapped in his garment, having placed one end under his feet and the other under his head." Musa greeted him with peace, and he uncovered his face and said: "Is there peace in your land? Who are you?" He said: "I am Musa." He said: "The Musa of the Children of Israel?" He said: "Yes." He said: "What is your affair?" He said: "I have come so that you may teach me from what you have been taught of right guidance." He said: "Is it not enough for you that the reports of the Torah are in your hand and that revelation comes to you? O Musa, I have knowledge that it is not fitting for you to know, and you have knowledge that it is not fitting for me to know." Then a bird came and took a little from the sea with its beak, and he said: "By Allah, my knowledge and your knowledge, compared to the knowledge of Allah, are only like what this bird has taken with its beak from the sea." Then, when they had embarked on the ship, they found small ferries carrying the people of this shore to that shore; they recognized him and said: "The righteous servant of Allah." We said to Sa'id: "Khidr?" He said: "Yes." They did not carry him for a fare, so he made a hole in it and drove in a peg. Musa said: "Have you made a hole in it to drown its people? You have certainly done a grave thing." Mujahid said: "a deplorable thing." He said: "Did I not say that you would never be able to have patience with me?" And the first was due to forgetfulness, the second was a condition, and the third was deliberate. He said: "Do not blame me for what I forgot, and do not make my affair difficult for me." Then they met a boy, and he killed him. Ya'la ibn Muslim said, quoting Sa'id ibn Jubayr: "They found boys playing, and he took hold of a disbelieving boy who was clever, laid him down, then slaughtered him with a knife." He said: "Have you killed a pure soul" — one who had not committed any offense. Then they went on and found a wall about to collapse, so he set it upright. Sa'id said, demonstrating with his hand, and raised his hand and it stood upright. Ya'la said: I think Sa'id said: "he wiped it with his hand and it stood upright." He said: "If you had wished, you could have taken payment for it." Sa'id said: "payment that we could eat." He said he used to read it as "and there was behind them," while Ibn Abbas used to read it as "and there was ahead of them a king." They claim, from someone other than Sa'id, that this slain boy's name, they claim, was Jaysur. He said: "who seized every ship by force," and he intended that when it passed by him he would leave it because of its defect; then when they had passed, they would repair it and benefit from it afterward. Some say they sealed it with a bottle, others say with tar. His parents were believers, while he was a disbeliever. "So we feared that he would burden them with tyranny and disbelief," for his love would carry them to follow him in his religion. "So we intended that their Lord should replace him for them with one better in purity and closer in mercy" — the two of them being more merciful toward the replacement than toward the first one whom al-Khidr had killed. Someone other than Sa'id claimed that they said it was a girl; and Dawud ibn Abi Asim said, from more than one person, that it was a girl, and it reached me from Sa'id ibn Jubayr that it was a girl, and I found it in my father's book, from Yahya ibn Ma'in, from Hisham ibn Yusuf, likewise.