ثُمَّ أَرْسَلْنَا مُوسَىٰ وَأَخَاهُ هَٰرُونَ بِـَٔايَٰتِنَا وَسُلْطَٰنٍ مُّبِينٍ · إِلَىٰ فِرْعَوْنَ وَمَلَإِي۟هِۦ فَٱسْتَكْبَرُوا۟ وَكَانُوا۟ قَوْمًا عَالِينَ
thumma arsalnā mūsā wa akhāhu hārūna bi-āyātinā wa sulṭānin mubīn · ilā firʿawna wa malaʾihī fa'stakbarū wa kānū qawman ʿālīn
"Then We sent Moses and his brother Aaron (Hārūn) with Our signs and a clear warrant: to Pharaoh and his notables. They grew arrogant; they were a people who held themselves high."
The word order must be recorded: Aaron is named not by his name first but by the description brother — akhāhu hārūn.
I give this as an observation: in this sūra most of the prophets are unnamed; Aaron's name is given, but a relation is placed in front of it. And this relation will find its counterpart in the language of the objection in the forty-seventh verse: a-nuʾminu li-basharayni mithlinā — in the dual. The other side addresses the two of them together.
The root س-ل-ط: to get on top of a thing, to have mastery, to hold power. Sulṭān — it means both power and proof; the lexicographers explain the second sense as "the argument that silences its opponent and prevails".
And āyāt and sulṭān must be recorded together: two separate things are named. The lexicographers explain this in two ways:
| Reading | Explanation |
|---|---|
| 1 | Āyāt are the miracles, and sulṭān is the force of proof they carry — the conjunction is explicative |
| 2 | They are two separate things: the miracles, and a clear argument |
And the word order must be recorded: the sentence is built with kānū (a perfect, reporting continuity). The arrogance, that is, is not a reaction that began with the coming of the messengers — it is a state that existed beforehand.
I give this as my own reading, its ground being the order of the two verbs: first fa'stakbarū (they grew arrogant — the reaction to the call), then wa kānū qawman ʿālīn (they were already a people who held themselves high — the prior state). After telling the reaction, the sentence lays down the ground of the reaction.
| Verse | Word | Who |
|---|---|---|
| 46 | qawman ʿālīn | Pharaoh's company |
| 91 | la-ʿalā baʿḍuhum ʿalā baʿḍ | The supposed gods — prevailing over one another |
| 116 | fa-taʿāla'llāhu'l-maliku'l-ḥaqq | God |
The same root, with three different subjects. This is a distribution that can be verified within the sūra, and I record it as an observation: the verb of rising shifts place across the sūra and is at last attached to a single place.