Tafsir of Yusuf 12:71

"They said, and they turned toward them"—meaning the brothers. "And they turned toward them"—meaning toward those seeking the provisions, as understood from the context, or toward the caller (the crier) if it is intended that there was a group, as if he—peace be upon him—had appointed callers to proclaim that, according to what is in al-Bahr. The clause is in the position of a state (hal) of the pronoun in "they said," brought to indicate their agitation at what they had heard, as it was contrary to their situation. That is to say: they said it while turning toward them.

"What is it that you miss?"—meaning, what thing do you lack, or what is it that you find missing? Faqd (missing/loss), as al-Raghib said, is the absence of a thing after its existence; thus, it is more specific than ‘adam (non-existence), for the latter is said of that which was never in existence at all. It is also said: it is the absence of a thing such that it goes astray from you, not by your own doing. The gist of the meaning is: "What has been lost from you?" The use of the imperfect tense (tufqidun) is to bring the image to mind. al-Sulami read it as tufqiduna (with a damma on the ta'), derived from afqadtuhu, meaning "I found it missing," similar to ahmadtuhu (I found him praiseworthy). Abu Hatim considered this reading weak, but it is justified by what has been mentioned. Under both readings, the departure from the apparent meaning—which would have been "What has been stolen from you?"—is, as has been said, to demonstrate the perfection of their integrity by showing that nothing was stolen from them, let alone that they themselves could be the thieves. Rather, it is only possible that something might have been lost by them, so they asked them "what." This contains guidance for them to observe good manners, to avoid recklessness, and to avoid attributing anything undesirable to the innocent, especially by way of emphasis; therefore, they altered their speech, as they said in their response: