Ya-Sin · Makki · ayah 47 of 83

Ya-Sin 36:47

وَإِذَا قِيلَ لَهُمْ أَنفِقُوا۟ مِمَّا رَزَقَكُمُ ٱللَّهُ قَالَ ٱلَّذِينَ كَفَرُوا۟ لِلَّذِينَ ءَامَنُوٓا۟ أَنُطْعِمُ مَن لَّوْ يَشَآءُ ٱللَّهُ أَطْعَمَهُۥٓ إِنْ أَنتُمْ إِلَّا فِى ضَلَـٰلٍ مُّبِينٍ

“And when it is said to them, "Spend from that which Allāh has provided for you," those who disbelieve say to those who believe, "Should we feed one whom, if Allāh had willed, He would have fed? You are not but in clear error."”

Saheeh International

Essence

The poor will be fed either way; the only question this ayah leaves you is whether the provision passes through your hand.

A reflection

Using God's will as a reason to keep your wallet shut

At an office lunch, someone mentions a famine appeal. A colleague shrugs and says, half joking, that if God wanted those people fed, they would be fed. A couple of people laugh. The conversation moves on to the weekend.

That line is fourteen centuries old, and this ayah records it word for word. Anuṭʿimu man law yashāʾu Allāhu aṭʿamahu: shall we feed someone whom Allah would have fed, if He willed?

The commentators describe the setting. The believers had heard the Prophet ﷺ speak of everything happening by Allah's will. Some of the Quraysh mocked that belief by turning it into an excuse. One early report has them saying: shall Allah make him poor, and we feed him?

One commentator names the argument for what it is. This, he says, is what misers cling to: we will not give to someone Allah has deprived. And he dismantles it. Allah made some rich and some poor as a test. He withheld from the poor not out of stinginess, and commanded the rich to spend not because He needed their money. He did it to test the rich through the poor.

That is the truer picture. Divine will is not a reason to do nothing. It is the setting of the test. The poor person in front of you is not evidence that Allah has abandoned them. He is the exam paper placed in front of you.

The same logic would excuse anything. If Allah willed, the sick would be healed, so why visit them? If He willed, the ignorant would know, so why teach them? Nobody applies it that way to their own needs. It only ever surfaces when someone else is hungry.

The full entry has 5 more reflections, questions to sit with, and "Live it today" - with the words, the roots and the tafsir alongside. Free, no account, works offline.