Quran 26:16 and how did al-Mufaseren deal with mistakes in grammatical/syntactical mistakes in the Qur'an

Submitted by dhimmi no more, Nov 21, 2018 at 13:16

Dr Pipes,

There is a very interesting youtube video about the above verse and I urge readers to watch it first

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PihTYLAVrxI

This is what the verse says:

فَأْتِيَا فِرْعَوْنَ فَقُولَا إِنَّا رَسُولُ رَبِّ الْعَالَمِينَ

Here is the meaning:

1. فَأْتِيَا Or You two (Moses and Aaron) come to. This does not make sense, because it should be: You two (Moses and Aaron) GO to or اذهبا.

Pickthall translates it as "And come", while Abdel Haleem (whose mother tongue us Arabic) translate it as: "and go" But it should be اذهبا not فَأْتِيَا

2. Next problem: Is there a missing الى or Ila or "To" following the فَأْتِيَا ? Logic would dictate that you go TO!

3. Next word is فِرْعَوْنَ or Pharaoh (Notice that there is no definite article which means that this is a name not a title which is very odd indeed)

4. Next problem: Is there a missing ثما or "and then" after the word Pharaoh ? Because it is : Go to Pharaoh and then say (as you shall see) or Allah has no idea about chronology.

5. فَقُولَا or Faqoula means "and both of you say" (notice that both Faqoula and Fa'tiya are in muthana or dual)

6. إِنَّا on Inna means "we are" (can be used for dual and plural)

7. رَسُولُ Or Rasul or Messenger and this is a mistake in grammar and here is why: The verse talks about Moses and Aaron so in Arabic the sentence should be in muthana (dual) not in singular as in the case of this word

Here is what al-Mufasereen tell us about this word and what it means: رَسُولُ or Rasul

1. al-Tabari wrote and he is fixing this grammatical error by saying: أرسلت رسالة ورسولا or I (Allah) sent a message and two messengers! Which does not make any sense

2. Ibn kathir implicitly admits that this is indeed a mistake and he writes: إنا رسولا ربك or We are the two messengers of your Lord

Notice that he is using the correct grammatical muthana (dual) Rasula not the incorrect Quranic Rasul

3. al-Qurtubi is fixing the mistake by saying: " رسول " بمعنى " رسالة " or Rasul means a message which is nonsense.

He also offers other alternatives and he says: ويجوز أن يكون الرسول في معنى الاثنين والجمع or "it is possible that the messenger (Rasul) can be used in the two (dual) and in the plural." Which is also absolute nonsense

More nonsense from al-Qurtubi? معناه إن كل واحد منا رسول رب العالمين or "the meaning is each one (Moses and Aaron) of us is a messenger of the Lord of the worlds"! Or more nonsense

So you can see why those that translate this verse could translate the word Rasul as:

1. Messengers

2. Messenger

3. Message.

But the implications here are huge. It means we really do not know for sure what the author of the Qur'an is really saying in the case of this verse

Oh رَبِّ الْعَالَمِينَ or Rab al-'Alameen? it means the Lord of the two worlds/worlds/For ever

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