Planets or Stars? When the Qur’an Quotes the Torah and Mufassirin don’t get the memo

The Qur’an says about Joseph’s dream:

إِذْ قَالَ يُوسُفُ لأَبِيهِ يَا أَبَتِ إِنِّي رَأَيْتُ أَحَدَ عَشَرَ كَوْكَبًا وَالشَّمْسَ  وَالْقَمَرَ رَأَيْتُهُمْ لِي سَاجِدِينَ

 

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.

 

قَالَ يَا بُنَيَّ لَا تَقْصُصْ رُؤْيَاكَ عَلَىٰ إِخْوَتِكَ فَيَكِيدُوا لَكَ كَيْدًا ۖ إِنَّ الشَّيْطَانَ لِلْإِنْسَانِ عَدُوٌّ مُبِينٌ

 

He said: “O my son! do not relate your vision to your brothers, lest they devise a plan against you.” Surely the Adversary is an open enemy to man. (12.4-5)

This is from the Biblical account, confirming, as the Qur’an says of itself, but Midrashically explaining the motivation of Isaac’s admonishion in the Torah:

וַיְסַפֵּר אֶל-אָבִיו, וְאֶל-אֶחָיו, וַיִּגְעַר-בּוֹ אָבִיו, וַיֹּאמֶר לוֹ מָה הַחֲלוֹם הַזֶּה אֲשֶׁר חָלָמְתָּ: הֲבוֹא נָבוֹא, אֲנִי וְאִמְּךָ וְאַחֶיךָ, לְהִשְׁתַּחֲו‍ֹת לְךָ, אָרְצָה

 

And he told it to his father, and to his brethren; and his father admonished him, saying to him: “What is this dream that you have dreamed? Shall I and your mother and your brothers really come to bow down to you to the earth?”(37.10)

What’s interesting is that the Qur’an uses a term that people wrongly translate as “planets” (كَوْكَبًا) in Arabic (as it is not the typical Qur’anic word for “stars” نجوم), but this is actually the Torah’s word for “stars” (כּוֹכָבִים) here, so the Qur’an quotes the Hebrew term, from the verse just prior:

וַיֹּאמֶר, הִנֵּה חָלַמְתִּי חֲלוֹם עוֹד, וְהִנֵּה הַשֶּׁמֶשׁ וְהַיָּרֵחַ וְאַחַד עָשָׂר כּוֹכָבִים, מִשְׁתַּחֲוִים לִי

 

And he dreamed yet another dream, and told it to his brothers, and said: ‘Behold, I have dreamed yet a dream: and, behold, the sun and the moon and eleven stars bowed down to me.’ (37.9)

The Qur’anic passage is Midrashically situated between verse 9 and 10. We read that the brothers were told, and that Isaac admonished him not to speak about this vision because of how audacious it would sound. The Qur’an indicates that Isaac had forewarned him, however, not to speak this way. This is a typical Midrashic approach to the Torah – saying what was really going on, or reading between the lines, so to speak. This is also typically of how the Qur’an Midrashically approaches the Torah.