Al-Fajr · Makki · ayah 20 of 30

Al-Fajr 89:20

وَتُحِبُّونَ ٱلْمَالَ حُبًّا جَمًّا

“And you love wealth with immense love.”

Saheeh International

Essence

Their love of money was like a well that refills as fast as it is drawn: never satisfied, and never once run dry.

A reflection

The well that refills

A man sets himself a savings target in his twenties: one hundred thousand pounds, and then he will relax. It takes him nineteen years. The evening the balance crosses the line, he opens the spreadsheet and looks at it for a while. Then he changes the target to two hundred and fifty. He does not relax. He does not even celebrate.

Jamm describes water gathering back into a well after it has been drawn. A jamūm well never runs low: however much you take, it rises again. A measure of grain heaped above its rim has its jumām. A horse left unridden for a while regains its strength; that too is jamma. The root is abundance that gathers itself back.

That is this ayah's picture of loving money. Not a single purchase, not ambition as such, but a love that refills. Every time the thirst is satisfied, it rises again. One of the earliest commentators explains the phrase from the same image: water gathering in a basin.

Sahih al-Bukhari and Sahih Muslim report the Prophet's ﷺ description of exactly this. If the son of Ādam had a valley full of gold, he would want a second. Nothing fills his mouth but the dust. And Allah turns in mercy to whoever turns to Him.

The hadith ends with mercy, and that matters. The well-like craving is part of being human. It is not a sin to feel it. It becomes the problem the ayah describes when it is loved: when we stop resisting it and start serving it.

The man with the spreadsheet does not need to stop saving. He needs to notice the well. Next time a target is reached, pause before setting the next. Say alḥamdulillāh for the one you reached. Then give some of it away, to lower the water.

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.