“So I fled from you when I feared you. Then my Lord granted me sound judgment and made me one of the messengers. Is this a favor you hold over me because you have enslaved the Children of Israel?” (21–22)

“So I fled from you when I feared you,” to Midian. “Then my Lord granted me sound judgment,” meaning prophethood. Muqatil said: it means knowledge and understanding. “And He made me one of the messengers.”

Regarding His words, “Is this a favor you hold over me because you have enslaved the Children of Israel?” scholars differed over its interpretation. Some understood it as an acknowledgment, while others understood it as a denial.

Those who held that it is an acknowledgment said: Moses counted it as a favor Pharaoh had done him, in that he raised him and did not kill him as he had killed the other boys of the Children of Israel, nor enslave him as he had enslaved the Children of Israel. Its implied meaning is: “Yes, it is a favor you have done me: you enslaved the Children of Israel but left me, and so did not enslave me.”

Those who held that it is a denial said that the words, “Is this a favor,” are phrased as a question (1): “Or is this a favor?” The interrogative particle has been omitted, as in the verse, “Or are they immortal?” (al-Anbiya 21:34). A poet said (2):

“Will you depart from the settlement at evening, or set out early? ... What harm would it do you if you waited?”

That is: “Will you depart from the settlement?”

Umar ibn Abd Allah ibn Abi Rabi'ah said:

“I have not forgotten her pause on the day of departure, ... her eyes drenched in tears;

And her words, while the mounts stood waiting: ... ‘Will you leave me thus and go away?’”

That is: “Will you leave me?” Moses is saying: “You remind me of having raised me, yet you forget your crime against the Children of Israel—enslaving them and treating them vilely?” Or he means: “How can you remind me of having raised me when you enslaved my people? Whoever sees his people humiliated is himself humiliated. Thus, your enslavement of the Children of Israel has nullified your kindness to me.”

It was also said that its meaning is: “You remind me of having raised me.” His words, “because you have enslaved the Children of Israel,” mean: Because you enslaved the Children of Israel and killed their children, I was driven to you, so that you raised and cared for me. Had you not enslaved them and killed them, I would have had members of my own family to raise me, and they would not have cast me into the river. So what favor do you have over me?

The word ʿabbadta means: “you made them slaves.” One may say: ʿabbadtu so-and-so, aʿbadtu-hu, taʿabbadtu-hu, or istaʿbadtu-hu—that is, “I took him as a slave.”