Living The Quran
From Issue: 1062 [Read full issue]
Wealth and Poverty
Al-Baqara (The Cow) Sura 2: Verse 268 (Partial)
"Satan promises you poverty and commands you to indecency, and God promises you forgiveness from Him, and bounty."
Satan promises you poverty because of his poverty, and God promises you forgiveness because of His generosity. Satan himself is poor toward the Real, so he promises poverty, for that is what he has and that is what his hands reach. His harvest was burned, so he wants the harvest of others to burn as well. The Lord of the Worlds, who is forgiving and servant-caressing, promises forgiveness and generosity. Yes, everyone does what is worthy of him, and the pot pours what it has inside. Satan invites to avarice and eagerness for this world, and that, in reality, is poverty. God invites to contentment and seeking the afterworld, and that is nothing but wealth.
The respect due to wealth in the religion is greater, for in this world, the person is content and has no need for the creatures, whispering secretly with the Real in his heart. In the next world he will dwell in the scented garden of bounty and generosity and the ocean of face-to-face vision, drowned in the Greatest Light.
Shaykh al-Islam Ansari said, "Wealth is three things: wealth of property, wealth of disposition, and wealth of heart. Wealth of property is three things: The lawful is a tribulation, the unlawful a curse, and the excessive punishment. Wealth of disposition is three things: contentment, satisfaction, and chivalry. Wealth of heart is three things: an aspiration greater than this world, an object of desire better than the next world, and a yearning for the vision of the Patron."
Compiled From:
"Kashf al-Asrar wa Uddat al-Abrar" - Rashid al-Din Maybudi, p. 92