قَالَ رَبِّ ٱلسِّجْنُ أَحَبُّ إِلَىَّ مِمَّا يَدْعُونَنِىٓ إِلَيْهِ وَإِلَّا تَصْرِفْ عَنِّى كَيْدَهُنَّ أَصْبُ إِلَيْهِنَّ وَأَكُن مِّنَ ٱلْجَٰهِلِينَ
Qāla rabbi's-sijnu aḥabbu ilayya mimmā yadʿūnanī ilayh · Wa-illā taṣrif ʿannī kaydahunna aṣbu ilayhinna wa-akun mina'l-jāhilīn · Fa'stajāba lahu rabbuhu fa-ṣarafa ʿanhu kaydahunna innahu huwa's-samīʿu'l-ʿalīm
"He said: 'My Lord! Prison is dearer to me than what they call me to. If You do not turn their scheming away from me, I shall incline to them and be among the ignorant.' His Lord answered him and turned their scheming away from him. He is indeed the Hearing, the Knowing."
And this is one of the most remarkable verbal weaves of the sūra: the pattern aḥabb (dearer) occurs twice in the sūra, and both times it names a preference:
| Verse | Expression | Who says it | What is preferred |
|---|---|---|---|
| 8 | La-Yūsufu wa-akhūhu aḥabbu ilā abīnā minnā | The brothers | The distribution of the father's love — a complaint |
| 33 | As-sijnu aḥabbu ilayya mimmā yadʿūnanī ilayh | Joseph | Prison — a choice |
And the comparison is worth recording; I give it as my own reading: in the eighth verse aḥabb was the measure of how much love another shows one — and it bred an enmity. In the thirty-third verse the same pattern reports a person's own choice, and a prison is accepted. The same word in two different offices: one a claim of entitlement, the other a preference.
And the point of word order is this, and it must be recorded: the sentence does not say "prison is good". It compares two things and does not name the other side of the comparison: mimmā yadʿūnanī ilayh — "what they call me to".
I give this as an observation: the text avoids naming the proposal. This is the general bearing of the sūra in this section — nowhere across the scene is the act named outright; veiled expressions are used, such as sūʾ, faḥshāʾ and mā yadʿūnanī ilayh.
And the heaviest sentence of the prayer is here. Aṣbu — root ص-ب-و: to incline, to be carried away by a childish craving. From the same root comes ṣabī — a child.
The construction of the sentence must be recorded: the man does not trust his own strength. He builds a conditional: "if You do not turn it away, I shall incline."
I record this as my own reading, and its ground is the conditional particle (illā = in lā): the sentence is not a declaration of resistance but an admission of incapacity. And this comes from the same place as the sentence wa-mā ubarriʾu nafsī in verse 53. The two sentences may be compared:
| Verse | Expression | What it conveys |
|---|---|---|
| 33 | Illā taṣrif ʿannī … aṣbu ilayhinn | If protection does not come from outside I cannot hold out |
| 53 | Wa-mā ubarriʾu nafsī | I do not declare myself innocent |
وَأَكُن مِّنَ ٱلْجَٰهِلِين — jahl here conveys not ignorance but conduct. The same sense was treated at al-Qaṣaṣ 28/52-55 (lā nabtaghi'l-jāhilīn): in Arabic the opposite of jahl may be not only ʿilm but also ḥilm (measured self-command). I rely on that treatment.
And the thirty-fourth verse is worth recording: it is said plainly that the prayer was answered — and the content of the answer is the exact counterpart of what was asked: fa-ṣarafa ʿanhu kaydahunna.
I give this as an observation about the structure: the request in verse 33 (taṣrif ʿannī kaydahunna) and the response in verse 34 (ṣarafa ʿanhu kaydahunna) are built with the same words. That is, the text shows the answering by repeating the same wording.
And a tension must be recorded, as my own reading: what comes immediately after the prayer is answered is the prison (35). The text does not tie the answering of a prayer to an improvement of circumstances — what was asked for was "the turning away of the scheming", and that came to pass; the prison is an outcome lying outside the request.