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Korah // Encyclopaedia of the Qurʾān
A figure living at the time of Moses (q.v.) who is mentioned both in the Bible and the Qurʾān. He is described in q 28:76-82 and briefly mentioned in two other verses. Korah (Ar. Qārūn) is introduced as one of the people of Moses, yet one who treated them unjustly (q 28:76-82; see justice and injustice; oppression). God accorded him such enormous treasures that “its very keys (mafātiḥahu) were too heavy a burden for a company of men” (q 28:76) to carry. When people urged him to use his wealth (q.v.) for God's purposes and, with the world to come in mind (see eschatology ), he would answer that the only reason he possessed his wealth was because of his knowledge (see knowledge and learn- ¶ ing ). Finally, when Korah “went forth unto his people in his adornment” (q 28:79) and his people argued about his fortune, God decreed his death, making the earth swallow him and his house (see punishment stories; chastisement and punishment). Two other verses mention the name of Korah. In the first of these (q 29:39) he, along with Pharaoh (q.v.) and Hāmān (q.v.), arrogantly (see arrogance ) opposes the signs (q.v.) brought by Moses, while in the other he, along with Pharaoh and Hāmān, accuses Moses of being a lying sorcerer (q 40:24; see soothsayers; magic; lie; insanity).
As well as containing some elements that are similar to the biblical story of Korah (cf. Num 16; see scripture and the qurʾān; myths and legends in the qurʾān), the Qurʾān mainly stresses the fact, which had already been highlighted in rabbinical literature, of his great wealth. A saying of Muḥammad, which reflects qurʾānic content, mentions his name along with those of Hāmān and Pharaoh as examples of people destined to go to hell (q.v.; Ibn Ḥanbal, Musnad, ii, 169). Exegetical traditions usually recount that Korah was Moses' cousin or, according to Muḥammad b. Isḥāq (d. 150/767), his uncle (Ṭabarī, Tafsīr, xx, 105; see exegesis of the qurʾān: classical and medieval ). He was so handsome or his voice, while reciting the Torah (q.v.), was so beautiful that he was named the Enlightened (al-munawwar). His appearance among his people is described with a wealth of detail, from his luxurious dress to the magnificence of his escort, consisting of three hundred maids, four thousand riding beasts with purple saddles or with seventy thousand or more soldiers. The keys of his treasures were the leather keys of his store-houses; they were no larger than a finger and so heavy that only forty men or forty camels or sixty mules could carry them. ¶ Korah, envious of the prophethood of Moses and of the sacerdotal privileges of Aaron (q.v.; Abū l-Layth al-Samarqandī, Tafsīr, ii, 525; see prophets and prophethood ), planned to get rid of Moses when the duty of the alms tax was revealed (see almsgiving ). He paid a woman to accuse Moses of adultery (see adultery and fornication ) but the woman, when examined by Moses, retracted her accusation and unmasked Korah's plan. Moses ordered the earth to seize Korah and, in spite of his pleas, he and his house were completely swallowed up (Muqātil, Tafsīr, iii, 357). Other traditions state that every day Korah sinks deeper into the earth by the height of a man and that he will continue sinking at this rate until the day of resurrection (q.v.). It is also said, however, that while sinking in the earth, one day Korah heard Jonah's (q.v.) voice in the belly of the whale and that he felt sorry when he learned of Moses' and Aaron's death; as a reward for this, God relieved him of the punishment (Majlisī, Biḥār, xiii, 253; see reward and punishment ). Some other reports tell of Korah's knowledge of alchemy and they are usually linked to the qurʾānic statement about his knowledge. Some traditions specify that he was able to change lead and copper into silver and gold (q.v.) or that Korah learned the art of alchemy from his wife, who was Moses' sister (Kisāʾī, Qiṣaṣ, 229; see medicine and the qurʾān; metals and minerals).
The origin of the Arabic form of the name of Korah (Qārūn) is unknown but seems to parallel the form of other names such as Aaron (Hārūn, Horovitz, ku, 131).
- Roberto Tottoli
- Bibliography
- Primary
ʿAbd al-Razzāq, Tafsīr, ii, 93-4
Abū l-Layth al-Samarqandī, Tafsīr, ii, 525-8
Ibn Ḥanbal, Musnad, Cairo 1895, ii, 169
Ibn ¶ al-Jawzī, Zād, Damascus 1953-4, vi, 239-45
Khāzin, Lubāb, v, 181-5
Kisāʾī, Qiṣaṣ, 229-30
al-Majlisī, Muḥammad Bāqir, Biḥār al-anwār, Beirut 1983, xiii, 249-58
Māwardī, Nukat, iv, 264-71
Mujāhid, Tafsīr, ed. Abū l-Nīl, 532-3
Muqātil, Tafsīr, iii, 355-8
Qummī, Tafsīr, Beirut 1991, ii, 144-6
Rāzī, Tafsīr, xxv, 12-8
Sibṭ Ibn al-Jawzī, Mirʾāt, 449-52
Suyūṭī, Durr, 8 vols., Cairo 1983, vi, 436-43
Ṭabarī, Tafsīr, Cairo 1968, xx, 105-22
id., Taʾrīkh, ed. de Goeje, i, 517-27
Thaʿlabī, Qiṣaṣ, 188-92
id., al-Tabṣira, Beirut 1970, i, 251-4
- Secondary
A. Geiger, Was hat Mohammed aus dem Judenthume aufgenommen? Leipzig 1902, 153
Horovitz, ku, 131
Jeffery, For. vocab., 231-2
D.B. Macdonald, Ḳārūn, in ei2, iv, 673
D. Sidersky, Les origines des légendes musulmanes dans le Coran et dans les vies des prophètes, Paris 1933, 95-97
Speyer, Erzählungen, 342-4
- Cite this page
Korah (Qārūn) // Encyclopaedia of Islam, THREE
Qārūn (the biblical Korah) is the protagonist of a Qurʾānic passage (Qurʾān 28:76–82) in which he is introduced as one “belonging to the people of Moses” who “became insolent to them.” God had accorded him such enormous treasures that their “very keys were too heavy a burden for a company of men” (Q 28:76). People urged him to act not with a view to this world but for the world to come, and he answered, “What I have been given is only because of a knowledge that is in me” (Q 28:78). He did not know that God had already destroyed “generations of men stronger than him” (Q 28:78). Thus, when Qārūn “went forth unto his people in his adornment” (Q 28:79) and his people began to discuss his fortune, God decreed his death and “made the earth swallow up him and his dwelling, and there was no host to help him” (Q 28:81). A few other Qurʾānic passages mention Qārūn alongside Pharaoh and Hāmān. In one, they arrogantly oppose Moses (Q 29:39), while in another they accuse Moses of being a sorcerer and say, “We also sent Moses, with Our signs and a clear authority, to Pharaoh, Hāmān, and Qārūn; they said, ‘A lying sorcerer’” (Q 40:24).
Exegetical literature and later narrative descriptions of Qārūn elaborate the story. He was either Moses’s cousin or his uncle (al-Ṭabarī, Jāmiʿ, 20:105–6), and he was nicknamed al-Nūr (lit., the light) because he was particularly handsome (al-Thaʿlabī, 213) or because his voice reciting the Torah was beautiful (al-Suyūṭī, 437; cf. variants in al-Majlisī, 250; al-Ṭabarī, Taʾrīkh, 518: variant nickname al-Munawwar, lit., the shining one). He appeared before his people in luxurious attire, with a magnificent escort consisting of hundreds of girls, thousands of riding beasts with purple saddles, and seventy thousand soldiers or more. Exegetes usually assert that Qārūn’s insolence in Q 28:76 is connected to his wearing clothes one span longer than people were accustomed to wear, which was considered inappropriate for a man (al-Suyūṭī, 437; Tottoli, 67), or that “his adornment” (Q 28:76) means that he presented himself to his people wearing luxurious yellow or red clothing (al-Suyūṭī, 440–1; cf. Tottoli, 70) made of materials such as silk and bearing jewels of every kind (al-Ḥayṣam, 400). The keys to his treasures were the leather keys of his storehouses, which were no larger than a finger but so heavy that it took forty men or sixty mules to carry them (al-Ṭabarī, Jāmiʿ, 106–8). He owned a house with walls covered in gold and with a golden door (al-Ṭabarī, Jāmiʿ, 118).
The confrontation between Moses and Qārūn took place while the Israelites were in the wilderness, refusing to enter the Holy Land (Qummī). Qārūn, envious of the prophethood of Moses and of the privileges of Aaron (al-Samarqandī, 2:525; al-Thaʿlabī, 215–6) planned to get rid of Moses. He paid a woman to accuse Moses of adultery, but the woman, when examined by Moses, retracted her accusation and revealed Qārūn’s plan (Mujāhid; al-Ṭabarī, Jāmiʿ, 116–8). Moses ordered the earth to seize Qārūn, and, in spite of Qārūn’s pleas, he and his house were completely swallowed up (Muqātil, 3:357). A tradition attributed to the prophet Muḥammad states that Qārūn every day sinks deeper into the earth by the height of a man and that he will continue sinking at this rate, not reaching the lower earth until the day of resurrection (Sibṭ Ibn al-Jawzī, 451). It is also said, however, that, while sinking into the earth, Qārūn heard Jonah’s voice in the belly of the whale and felt sorry when he learnt of Moses’s and Aaron’s deaths; as a reward, God relieved him of his punishment (al-Majlisī, 13:253). According to some reports, the Israelites for some time even accused Moses of having caused Qārūn’s death in order to take his wealth and his house (Muqātil, 357).
Some reports link Qārūn’s knowledge mentioned in the Qurʾān to alchemy and maintain that he was able to change lead and copper into silver and gold. Qārūn learnt alchemy from his wife, who was Moses’s sister, and built palaces with walls of gold and silver after Moses had been asked by God to cover the ark of the Torah with gold and to teach Qārūn this art (al-Kisāʾī, 229). He also learnt to spy on Moses (al-Rabghūzī, 1:260). Or Moses himself taught one-third of his magic each to Aaron, his sister, and Qārūn, but Qārūn was then able to acquire all of it (al-Ḥayṣam, 401).
Western studies have discussed the relation of the Qurʾānic Qārūn to the biblical Korah mentioned in the Book of Numbers (in part, 16:31–3 and 26:10), who rebelled treacherously against Moses and was swallowed up by the earth, with all his possessions. The relationship of biblical and rabbinic narratives on Korah to the Qurʾānic and Islamic narratives on Qārūn is discussed in several studies (Geiger; Speyer). The origin of the Arabic name Qārūn has been likened to names such as Aaron (Hārūn; see Sycz; Horovitz; Jeffery).
- Bibliography
- Sources
Aḥmad b. Ḥanbal, Musnad (Beirut 1991), 2:574, no. 6587
al-Hayṣam b. Muḥammad, Qiṣaṣ al-Qurʾān al-Karīm, ed. Muḥammad ʿAbduh Ḥatāmila and Muḥammad Jāsim al-Mashhadānī (Amman 2006), 399–406
al-Kisāʾī, Qiṣaṣ al-anbiyāʾ, ed. Isaac Eisenberg (Leiden 1922–3), 229–30, ed. and trans. Wheeler M. Thackston Jr., The Tales of the prophets of al-Kisaʾi (Boston 1978), 245–6
al-Majlisī, Biḥār al-anwār (Beirut 1983), 13:249–58
Mujāhid b. Sulaymān, Tafsīr (Cairo 1989), 532–3
Muqātil b. Sulaymān, Tafsīr (Cairo 1979–89), 3:355–8
al-Qummī, Tafsīr (Beirut 1991), 2:144–5
al-Rabghūzī, Qiṣaṣ al-anbiyāʾ, ed. Hendrik E. Boeschoten and John O’Kane, Stories of the prophets (Leiden 1995, 20152), 1:260–3, 2:301–5
al-Suyūṭī, al-Durr al-manthūr fī l-tafsīr al-maʾthūr (Beirut 1983), 6:436–43
al-Ṭabarī, Jāmiʿ al-bayān ʿan taʾwīl āyāt al-Qurʾān (Cairo 1968), 20:105–19
al-Ṭabarī, Taʾrīkh al-rusul wa-l-mulūk, ed. M. J. de Goeje et al. (Leiden 1879–1901), 1:517–27, ed. and trans. William M. Brinner, The History of al-Ṭabarī, vol. 3, The children of Israel (Albany 1991), 99–111
al-Thaʿlabī, Qiṣaṣ al-anbiyāʾ (Cairo 1954), 213–7, trans. William M. Brinner, ʿArāʾis al-Majālis fī Qiṣaṣ al-Anbiyāʾ or Lives of the prophets (Leiden 2002), 353–60.
- Studies
Amina Adil, Gaben des Lichts. Die Wundersamen Geschichten der Gesandten Gottes (Kandern im Schwarzwald 1999), 351–5
A. Geiger, Was hat Mohammed aus dem Judenthume aufgenommen? (Bonn 1833), trans. Judaism and Islam (Madras 1898), 121–2
Max Grünbaum, Neue Beiträge zur semitischen Sagenkunde (Leiden 1893), 170–3
Josef Horovitz, Koranische Untersuchungen (Berlin and Leipzig 1926), 131
Arthur Jeffery, The foreign vocabulary of the Qurʾān (Baroda 1938), 231–2
D. B. MacDonald, Ḳārūn, EI2
Gabriel S. Reynolds, The Qurʾān and the Bible, New Haven 2018
Abū l-Layth al-Samarqandī, Tafsīr = Baḥr al-ʿulūm, ed. ʿAlī Muḥammad Muʿawwaḍ, ʿĀdil Aḥmad ʿAbd al-Mawjūd, and Zakariyyāʾ ʿAbd al-Majīd al-Nawutī (Beirut 1993), 2:525–8
Sibṭ Ibn al-Jawzī, Mirʾāt al-zamān fī taʾrīkh al-aʿyān, vol. 1, ed. Iḥsān ʿAbbās (Beirut 1985), 1:449–52
D. Sidersky, Les origines des légendes musulmanes dans le Coran et dans les vies des prophètes (Paris 1933), 95–7
Heinrich Speyer, Die biblischen Erzählungen im Qoran (Gräfenhainichen 1931), 342–4
S. Sycz, Ursprung und Wiedergabe der biblischen Eigennamen im Koran (Frankfurt am Main 1903), 42–3
Roberto Tottoli, Tradizioni islamiche sull’uso di tessuti e vestiti, in Manuela Marín (ed.), Tejer y vestir. De la antigüedad al Islam (Madrid 2001), 43–72.
- Cite this page
Tottoli, Roberto, “Korah (Qārūn)”, in: Encyclopaedia of Islam, THREE, Edited by: Kate Fleet, Gudrun Krämer, Denis Matringe, John Nawas, Everett Rowson. Consulted online on 19 December 2022 <http://dx.doi.org.wikipedialibrary.idm.oclc.org/10.1163/1573-3912_ei3_COM_35673>
First print edition: 9789004464636, 20221101, 2022-6