And when they went in before Joseph, he took his brother unto him, saying: Lo! I, even I, am thy brother, therefore sorrow not for what they did. 69 Then, while Joseph was having their provisions loaded, he put his drinking-cup in his brother's saddlebag. And then a herald cried: "Travellers, you are thieves." 70 They, turning towards them, said: "What is it that you have missed?" 71 They said: "We have missed the (golden) bowl of the king and for him who produces it is (the reward of) a camel load; I will be bound by it." 72 Said [the brothers]: "By God! Well do you know that we have not come to commit deeds of corruption in this land, and that we have not been thieving!" 73 (The Egyptians) said: "What then shall be the penalty of this, if ye are (proved) to have lied?" 74 They replied, "The penalty should be that he in whose saddlebag it is found, should be held [as bondman] to atone for the crime. That is how we punish the wrongdoers." 75 So he [Yusuf (Joseph)] began (the search) in their bags before the bag of his brother. Then he brought it out of his brother's bag. Thus did We plan for Yusuf (Joseph). He could not take his brother by the law of the king (as a slave), except that Allah willed it. (So Allah made the brothers to bind themselves with their way of "punishment, i.e. enslaving of a thief.") We raise to degrees whom We please, but over all those endowed with knowledge is the All-Knowing (Allah). 76 ۞ They said, 'If he is a thief, a brother of his was a thief before.' But Joseph secreted it in his soul and disclosed it not to them, saying, 'You are in a worse case; God knows very well what you are describing.' 77 They said: O chief! he has a father, a very old man, therefore retain one of us in his stead; surely we see you to be of the doers of good. 78 He answered: "May God preserve us from [the sin of] detaining any other than him with whom we have found our property - for then, behold, we would indeed be evildoers!" 79