The shop-owner and the man who stole out of poverty (I)

Countless times it has been, that I have read the injunction of the Quran – that I should be a good-doer. The good-doer in Islam is not only the one who does virtuous deeds intuitively, nor is she the one who does them reactionarily probably after receiving admonition to that effect. But the good doer in Islamic episteme is, going by Quran 3: 133, that person who displays three attitudes or habits exemplified in the following ayat – “those who spend in His path in times of prosperity and adversity; those who restrain their anger and those who pardon people for their infirmities and inadequacies”.

In other words, notions of good deeds consist of acts of benefaction that the believer is obliged to embark upon and dedicate not only to fellow believers but to non-believers. Thus the believer is obliged to treat everyone with kindness and compassion; he should comport himself like the rain that the Almighty sends down from the heavens; the rain that benefits both the atheist, the same way it does the polytheist and the same way it benefits the pious.

Is it not a matter of wonder that Fir’awn continued to receive divine sustenance here on earth despite his iniquities and acts of injustice? Would you not marvel that at a time the believer is experiencing lack and poverty, the unbeliever rollicks and frolics in plenum and plenitude? The ways of the Almighty are simply unknown for being unknowable.  

Now talking about virtuous acts, about spending in the path of the Almighty, jurists have classified humans in this regard into three groups. The first group belongs to those who spend nothing, whether in prosperity or adversity, whether in the vastness of the earthly blessings or in the days of famine and hardship. They are called “base” in an unqualified sense. These are people who have seized the branch of niggardliness, which is a tree whose roots are in hell and whose branches are in this world.

According to Anas ibn Mālik, the Messenger of the Almighty is reported to have said: “Open-handedness is like a tree in the Garden whose branches are in this world; when someone latches on to one of its branches, it will lead him to the Garden. And niggardliness is a tree in hell whose branches are in this world; when someone latches on to one of its branches, it will lead him to hell.”

The second group belongs to those who spend only when they are in prosperity but not in adversity or hardship. The largest number of humankind belongs to this group. These are people who are always in fear of poverty. These brethren of yours and mine do not know that, like the mystics would argue, nothing shall come from the unseen insofar as humans hold tightly onto the seen.

Thus I do not waver to give and lend; I do not vacillate whenever I am called upon to stand in support of the needy. I do not prevaricate to give out of what I have to those who are in acute need more than I do. The other day my phone was stolen. When I was asked about it by a brother, I responded by saying “I guess somebody who deserved it more than I do has taken it”!

Brethren, I have also since learned that the greatest challenge some of our brethren have is that they measure prosperity only by material acquisitions. As far as they are concerned, acts of benefaction begin and end with giving money out in aid of the poor and the needy. They have forgotten that the poor and the needy could equally be honourable givers and benefactors: givers of good conduct and benefactors in regard to beautiful utterances.

They have forgotten that giving in times of adversity also means offering words of comfort to those in distress and grief; that giving in times of acute need is actually more rewarding than in times of plenitude. In other words, there is hardly a creature on earth that cannot give; there is nobody out there who could not be victim of circumstance such that they become receivers of benefaction.

Nobody, born of the loin and the womb, is free from the vicissitudes of life – our earthly condition, we have learnt, is never permanent.

The third group among humankind in regard to acts of benefactions belongs to those who spend in both of these states – in time of ease and difficulty, in times of prosperity and adversity. Such are those who are sure and confident in the sufficiency of the Almighty God and in His assignment of daily provision.

They have recognized the secret of this report from the messenger of the Almighty: “Surely the holy spirit breathed into my mind that no one will die until his provision is complete. So be wary of the Almighty and go lightly in your pursuit of this world. Never let the tardiness of provision make you seek something of His bounties through disobedience, for what is with Him will only be reached by obeying Him”.