[249] Some say there were two springs, one of hot water wherein he bathed, and the other of cold of which he drank.—S. (B.)
[250] His wife also becoming young and handsome again, and bearing him twenty-six sons. Some, to express the great riches which were bestowed on Job after his sufferings, say he had two threshing-floors, one for wheat and the other for barley, and that God sent two clouds, which rained gold on the one and silver on the other till they ran over.—(J.) The traditions differ as to the continuance of Job’s calamities: one will have it to be eighteen years; another, thirteen; another, three; and another, exactly seven years seven months and seven hours.—S.
[251] Or ‘a palm-branch having a hundred leaves.’—S.
[253] The commentators generally suppose him to be the same person with the father-in-law of Moses, who is named in Scripture Reuel or Raguel, and Jethro. But Aḥmad Ibn-´Abd-El-Ḥaleem charges those who entertain this opinion with ignorance. They say (after the Jews) that he gave his son-in-law [Moses] that wonder-working rod with which he performed all those miracles in Egypt and the Desert, and also excellent advice and instructions; whence he had the surname of ‘Khaṭeeb-el-Ambiya,’ or ‘the Preacher to the Prophets.’—S.
[254] The Arabic word ‘ḍa´eef’ (weak) signifying also in the Ḥimyaritic dialect ‘blind,’ some suppose that Sho´eyb was so, and that the Midianites objected that to him as a defect which disqualified him for the prophetic office.—S.
[255] Which of the kings of Egypt this Pharaoh of Moses was is uncertain. Not to mention the opinions of the European writers, those of the East generally suppose him to have been El-Weleed, who according to some was an Arab of the tribe of ´Ád, or according to others the son of Muṣ´ab the son of Er-Reiyán the son of El-Weleed the Amalekite. There are historians, however, who suppose Ḳáboos the brother and predecessor of El-Weleed was the prince we are speaking of, and pretend he lived six hundred and twenty years and reigned four hundred. Which is more reasonable, at least, than the opinion of those who imagine it was his father Muṣ´ab or grandfather Er-Reiyán. Abu-l-Fida says the Muṣ´ab, being one hundred and seventy years old and having no child, while he kept the herds saw a cow calve, and heard her say at the same time, ‘O Muṣ´ab, be not grieved, for thou shalt have a wicked son, who will be at length cast into hell.’ And he accordingly had this Weleed, who afterwards coming to be king of Egypt proved an impious tyrant.—S. (A.F., Z.)