Community: Islam
Return to stories about wisdom.
Background:
In the Qur’an, Moses is one of God’s great messengers, sent to guide and lead the people of Israel. Moses told his people that he was the most learned amongst them, but God told Moses that there was someone more knowledgeable than him. Moses was eager to meet this person, and so God brought about their meeting, which is told in this story. Have a read and think about what implications it has for wisdom- where we can find it and how we can acquire it.
Follow up questions:
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Why do you think that the wise person asks Moses to remain patient with him?
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What does this story tell us about how wisdom might be clear or unclear in different situations?
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Can you think of a time when you thought something was a problem that turned out ok in the end?
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How do you think you might have reacted if you were Moses in this story?
Moses and the Wise Man
Moses met a man to whom God had granted knowledge. Moses said to the man, ‘May I follow you so that you can teach me some of the guidance you have been taught?’ The man said, ‘There are matters beyond your knowledge and you will not be able to remain patient with me.’ Moses replied, ‘God willing, you will find me patient. I will not disobey you in any way.’ The man said, ‘If you follow me, then do not question anything I do before I tell you about it myself.’
So they travelled on. Later, they got into a boat and the man made a hole in it. Moses said, ‘How could you make a hole in it? Do you want to drown its passengers? What a strange thing to do!’ He replied, ‘Did I not tell you that you would not remain patient with me?’ Moses said, ‘Forgive me for forgetting.’
They travelled on and reached a town where they asked the inhabitants for food, but the inhabitants refused. They saw a wall there that was at the point of falling down and the man repaired it. Moses said, ‘if you wished, you could have asked them to pay you for doing that and we could have used the money to buy food.’
The man said to Moses, ‘This is where you and I go our own ways. I will tell you the meaning of the things you were impatient about: the boat belonged to some needy people who fished for a living, and I damaged it because I knew that there was a king coming after them who was seizing every boat by force.
‘The wall belonged to two young orphans in the town and there was treasure buried beneath it which belonged to them. Their father was a righteous man, so your Lord intended them to reach maturity and then dig up their treasure as a mercy from your Lord. These are the explanations for those things you could not bear with patience.’