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Most High and in whose exclusive devotion there is no falling away.’
When the professor saw her pass on in speech with the passing of the clouds[1] and that she stayed not in answering, he rose to his feet and said, ‘I take God to witness, O Commander of the Faithful, that this damsel is more learned than I in Koranic exegesis and what pertains thereto.’ Then said she, ‘I will ask thee one question, which if thou answer, it is well: but if thou answer not, I will strip off thy clothes.’ ‘Ask on,’ quoth the Khalif; and she said, ‘Which verse of the Koran has in it three-and-twenty Kafs,[2] which sixteen Mims,[2] which a hundred and forty Ains,[2] and which section[3] lacks the formula, “To whom [God] belong might and majesty”?’ He could not answer, and she said to him, ‘Put off thy clothes.’ So he doffed them, and she said, ‘O Commander of the Faithful, the verse of the sixteen Mims is in the chapter Houd and is the saying of the Most High, “It was said, ‘O Noah, go down in peace from us, and blessing upon thee!’”;[4] that of the three-and-twenty Kafs is the verse called of the Faith, in the chapter of the Cow; that of the hundred and forty Ains is in the chapter of El Aaraf,[5] “And Moses chose seventy men of his tribe to [attend] our appointed time;[6] to each man a pair of eyes.”[7] And the set portion which lacks the formula, “To whom [God] belong might and majesty,” is that which comprises the chapters “The Hour draweth nigh and the Moon is cloven
- ↑ i.e. without hesitation or interruption.
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 2.2 Kaf, Mim and Ain, the 21st, 24th and 18th letters of the Arabic alphabet.
- ↑ The Koran is divided into sixty set portions, answering or equivalent to our Lessons, for convenience of use in public worship.
- ↑ Koran xi. 50.
- ↑ Name of the partition-wall between heaven and hell.
- ↑ Koran vii. 154.
- ↑ A play on the word ain, which means “eye.”
