Social Quranevery verse · a conversation
Sign in
سُورَةُ يُوسُفَ · 12:4
MeccanRevelation order ٥٣Juzʾ ١٢Page ٢٣٥

إِذْ قَالَ يُوسُفُ لِأَبِيهِ يَٰٓأَبَتِ إِنِّى رَأَيْتُ أَحَدَ عَشَرَ كَوْكَبًۭا وَٱلشَّمْسَ وَٱلْقَمَرَ رَأَيْتُهُمْ لِى سَٰجِدِينَ

٤
Saheeh International · EN

[Of these stories mention] when Joseph said to his father, "O my father, indeed I have seen [in a dream] eleven stars and the sun and the moon; I saw them prostrating to me."

Bio

Introduction

This is āyah 4 of Sūrat Yusuf (Joseph), the 53rd sūrah in the traditional order of revelation. It was revealed in the Meccan period and sits within Juzʾ 12. Meccan verses tend to address faith, the oneness of God, and the hereafter.

This introduction is a starting point — the community and Bilal will enrich it over time.

Bio

Revelation & occasion

Asbāb al-Nuzūl
Period
Meccan
Order revealed
53 of 114
Surah
Yusuf (12)
Occasion of revelation · Al-Wahidi

When Joseph said to his father, " O my father, surely I saw eleven stars and the sun and the moon. I saw them prostrating to me. " Ibn ʿAbbās said, " The eleven stars allude to the eleven brothers. " God is saying, " The stars are bright by themselves and people take to the road by them, " which is in His words, " By the stars they are guided " [16:16]. " In the same way Joseph's brothers had the brightness of prophecy, and within them was found the guidance of the people. " Their treachery toward their brother and their envy toward him are minor sins of the sort that occur for prophets. The wisdom in this is that the world's folk may come to know that the faultless is God, who is one and unique, and all other things have faults. In this meaning they have sung, I am the faulty and my Lord is pure- my faultiness is evidence of the Pure. It was said to Ḥasan, " Does the man of faith have envy? " He said, " What has made you forget the sons of Jacob? " Someone may say that Joseph was an immature child when he saw this dream, and it is known in the Shariah that no rulings apply to the act of a child. Since his act has no ruling, how can his dream have a ruling? The answer is that if the child's act is achieved by his own intention and aim, it can be attributed to his susceptibility to shortcoming and defect. But a dream is a divine showing, and in that children and adults are the same.

Commentary

Tafsir

4 works

Hafiz Ibn Kathir

(Remember) when Yusuf said to his father: "O my father! Verily, I saw (in a dream) eleven stars and the sun and the moon - I saw them prostrating themselves to me. (4) Yusuf's Dream Allah says, 'Mention to your people, O Muhammad, among the stories that you narrate to them, the story of Yusuf.' Prophet Yusuf (Joseph) mentioned his dream to his father, Prophet Ya'qub (Jacob), son of Prophet Ishaq (Isaac), son of Prophet Ibrahim (Abraham), peace be upon them all. 'Abdullah bin 'Abbas stated that the dreams of Prophets are revelations from Allah. Scholars of Tafsir explained that in Yusuf's dream the eleven stars represent his brothers, who were eleven, and the sun and the moon represent his father and mother. This explanation was collected from Ibn 'Abbas, Ad-Dahhak, Qatadah, Sufyan Ath-Thawri and 'Abdur-Rahman bin Zayd bin Aslam. Yusuf's vision became a reality forty years later, or as …
Provenance

Chains of transmission

Oral — isnād

  1. ~610–632 CERevelation & memorisation

    Received by the Prophet ﷺ and preserved by the ḥuffāẓ (memorisers) among the Companions.

  2. 1st century AHMutawātir transmissionawaiting curation

    Carried by mass-transmission through the generations of qurrāʾ.

  3. TodayLiving chainsawaiting curation

    Continuous ijāzah chains link reciters today back to the Prophet ﷺ.

Verified isnād chains for this āyah will be added by curators.

Written — the manuscript record

  1. ~650 CEʿUthmānic codicesawaiting curation

    The standardised muṣḥaf sent to the great cities (e.g. the Topkapı and Samarqand codices).

  2. 8th–10th c.Early Ḥijāzī & Kūfic foliosawaiting curation

    Surviving leaves in Birmingham, Sanaa, Paris (BnF) and beyond.

  3. Modern printModern printawaiting curation

    The 1924 Cairo edition → today: the standard printed muṣḥaf used worldwide.

A curated chain of manuscript images for this exact āyah — roughly one per century — is coming. Help us source and verify them.

The wall

And now — what do you think?

The text, its history and the classical commentary are laid out above. Share your own understanding, ask a question, or reason with others.

Sign in to add your voice to this verse.
No reflections yet — be the first.
Provenance

Community resources

No community resources for this verse yet.