Al-Layl · Makki · ayah 18 of 21

Al-Layl 92:18

ٱلَّذِى يُؤْتِى مَالَهُۥ يَتَزَكَّىٰ

“[He] who gives [from] his wealth to purify himself”

Saheeh International

Essence

He gives his wealth away to grow clean and to grow tall: the one transaction where what leaves your hand is what makes you richer.

A reflection

Pruning the roses in February

On a cold morning in late winter, an old gardener cuts his rose bushes back hard. Whole stems go into the barrow. A neighbour's child watches, horrified, and asks why he is killing them. 'So they'll flower,' he says. By June the bushes are taller than the fence and covered in blooms.

The mindful one in this surah 'gives his wealth, yatazakkā'. The root holds two meanings at once, growth and purity, and they meet in one picture. The Arabs said zakā al-zarʿ: the crop grew and gave its yield. A thriving field was a zarʿ zākin. They even called an even number zakā and an odd one khasā, because two is more than one. So yatazakkā is to seek to grow and to be made clean, both at once.

The commentators read it both ways. One early explanation: he gives his wealth to be purified of his sins. Others: he seeks to be pure and growing in Allah's sight, wanting no show and no reputation. The Quran uses the same pair of verbs elsewhere: 'Take charity from their wealth, to cleanse them and make them grow by it' (9:103).

Does Allah need our money? He does not. The giving is pruning, and the one who grows is the giver. Many people today feel weighed down by what they own. There are rooms full of things, accounts checked anxiously, and a low sense that life has become maintenance. This ayah offers a different relationship with wealth. Let part of it go, deliberately, for Allah, and watch what grows in its place.

The first root of this ayah's verb 'gives', ātā, is water running easily down its channel to the pool. Giving, in the first hearers' language, was something flowing where it was meant to flow. Wealth that never flows anywhere stagnates. Wealth that is let through the channel keeps the whole garden alive, including the gardener.

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.