Moses, the suffering servant and the treacherous rock

In answer to the video "Muhammad said, "Nothing Makes Water Impure"

Contrary to what this youtuber is trying to make a mountain of, besides wishful thinking, nothing indicates a correlation between the hadith on Moses taking a bath and losing his clothes, and the travelling well of Miriam.

In this hadith, which is another instance in both the Quran and traditions speaking of the Israelites' mistreatment of Moses, the suffering servant of God, the prophet Muhammad describes how sometimes a seemingly unfortunate event might turn into something beneficial in the long run. In that story, Moses was as usual the victim of a particular hurtful speech by his own people. It is interesting to note, before getting into the story how the HB describes God Himself wrathfully descending on those who kept on abusing him Numb12,Ex2:21. But this time, the way by which the rebellious were put back in their place was more subtle

"(The Prophet) Moosa (i.e. Moses), may Allaah exalt his mention, was a shy person and used to cover his body completely because of his extensive shyness. One of the children of Israel hurt him by saying, ‘He covers his body in this way only because of some defect in his skin, either leprosy or scrotal hernia, or he has some other defect.’" On a parenthetical note, other versions have a slight introductory variation "The (people of) Bani Israel used to take bath naked (all together) looking at each other. The Prophet Moses used to take a bath alone. They said, ‘By Allah! Nothing prevents Moses from taking a bath with us except that he has a scrotal hernia..."

Them taking a communal bath might be due to the particular, harsh and obviously uncomfortable circumstances of their exodus. The hadith continues

"...Allaah wished to clear Moosa, may Allaah exalt his mention, of what they said about him, so one day while Moosa, may Allaah exalt his mention, was in seclusion, he took off his clothes and put them on a stone and started taking a bath. When he had finished the bath, he moved towards his clothes so as to take them, but the stone took his clothes and fled; Moosa picked up his stick and ran after the stone saying, ‘O stone! Give me my garment!’ Till he reached a group of Bani Israa’eel who saw him naked then, and found him the best of what Allaah The Almighty had created, and Allaah cleared him of what they had accused him of. The stone stopped there and Moosa took and put his garment on and started hitting the stone with his stick. By Allaah, the stone still has some traces of the hitting, three, four or five marks".

The stone itself, or rock, might have been made loose as Moses touched it, then carried away by the stream, maybe due to the vegetation attached to it which kept it afloat, until it was stopped by an object or river bank. Nothing in the text nor common sense negates that possibility. Such a phenomenon isnt extraordinary and sometimes whole pieces of river banks with vegetation and rocks are carried a certain distance by a river. The only difference in that case is that it was God who caused that otherwise common and banal phenomenon to occur, in order to clear his suffering servant from the incessant calumnies of his stiff necked people.