The Incidents in Order of Telling

The first matter treated is his becoming a prophet: he is returning from Madyan with his wife, he sees a fire, and it is then that Allah (swt) speaks to him and bestows prophecy upon him.

The narrative then suddenly moves back, in a flashback, to the time when he was born, when his mother had to put him into a box and leave him in the river, with a string tied to it. That is taken up in more detail in the chapter on Sūrat al-Qaṣaṣ.

It then moves forward to him and his brother. His brother was a better speaker than he, because Mūsā had something of a stutter; and there is a reason given for the stutter. It is said that at a young age, while he was being brought up in the house of Pharaoh — a matter treated below — Pharaoh, being worried, put him to a test. He set a choice before him: there were two bowls, one of diamonds or some such sparkling stones, and the other of fire; and the child took the fire, as a child would, and burnt his tongue with it. Allah knows best; that is what is related. Allah knows best. So he had a stutter, and for this reason Hārūn (peace be upon him) is constantly at his side.

The two of them are then told to go and speak with Pharaoh. The command there is that he must be spoken to calmly, even though he calls himself God:

Speak to him qawlan layyinan, a gentle word.

The account then moves forward to the whole contest, the challenge with Pharaoh's magicians, and how they become Muslim, and Pharaoh's anger at it. Then, in quick succession — Pharaoh now being enraged — comes the escape: the escape of Mūsā (peace be upon him) with the Banū Isrāʾīl from Egypt. Pharaoh gathers his army and gives chase, but to his own death. It is when they are in the Red Sea — the Nile may have been named by mistake in one of the earlier chapters; it is in fact the Red Sea, not the River Nile — that Pharaoh is killed and dies; his body, however, is cast up, and thus he is mummified.

Then follows the whole account of Mūsā (peace be upon him) dealing no longer with Pharaoh but with the Banū Isrāʾīl, the Israelites, his own people, and of how they would constantly challenge him, with all that ensued.