۞ Women in the town began to gossip, "The nobleman's wife is trying to seduce her slave! Love for him consumes her heart! Indeed! We see her in manifest error." 30 So when she heard of their sly talk she sent for them and prepared for them a repast, and gave each of them a knife, and said (to Yusuf): Come forth to them. So when they saw him, they deemed him great, and cut their hands (in amazement), and said: Remote is Allah (from imperfection); this is not a mortal; this is but a noble angel. 31 She said, "This is he about whom you have been blaming me! And, indeed, I did try to make him yield to me, but he was unyielding. Now, however, if he does not do as I bid him, he shall certainly be put in prison and be humiliated." 32 He said, "My Lord, prison is more to my liking than that to which they invite me. And if You do not avert from me their plan, I might incline toward them and [thus] be of the ignorant." 33 Thereupon his Lord accepted his prayer and turned away their guile from him; surely He is the Hearing, the Knowing. 34 Then it occurred to them to cast Joseph into prison for a while even though they had seen clear signs (of Joseph's innocence and of the evil ways of their ladies). 35