O you who have believed, do not consume usury, doubled and multiplied, but fear Allaah that you may be successful. And fear the Fire, which has been prepared for the disbelievers. And obey Allaah and the Messenger that you may obtain mercy. And hasten to forgiveness from your Lord and a garden as wide as the heavens and earth, prepared for the righteous Who spend [in the cause of Allaah ] during ease and hardship and who restrain anger and who pardon the people - and Allaah loves the doers of good; And those who, when they commit an immorality or wrong themselves [by transgression], remember Allaah and seek forgiveness for their sins - and who can forgive sins except Allaah ? - and [who] do not persist in what they have done while they know. Those - their reward is forgiveness from their Lord and gardens beneath which rivers flow [in Paradise], wherein they will abide eternally; and excellent is the reward of the [righteous] workers. [3:130-136]
Tip of the day:
Pay heed to the different meanings of certain words (especially the Arabic)
Comments
The answer is, both. You can never seek forgiveness enough. The Prophet Muhammad (SAW) did so 100 times a day and he was who he was! So what about us?
Allaah is addressing those who believe in Him and the meeting with Him on the last day, those who believe in heaven and hell, those who believe in the Reckoning...
Like 'Abdullaah ibn Mas'ood said, when Allaah begins a verse with these words then you should pay attention, because it is either a good thing you are ordered to carry out or a bad thing you are to be cautious of. So if you follow what comes after this address it is a sign of strong faith while disobeying is a sign of weakness in faith. Allaah wants to draw our attention to something vry important. If we are true believers, we will be attentive to what follows so we can obey.
Here we are also reminded about seeking forgiveness:
1) When we commit a sin, we follow it by remembering Allaah, because a good action erases a sin
2) We seek forgiveness from Allaah
3) We have conviction that Allaah can forgive whomever He wills
4) And we give up the sin, or try our best to do so
Again we are reminded about spending, in ease and hardship. Our wealth is a test for us. Some of us are tested by decrease in wealth and others by increase. For those who have less, are they patient? Do they wait for halaal means or do they fall prey to seeking haraam means? For those who have alot, do they give charity, do they help those who have less? And for both groups, do they give charity in ease and hardship? Even if we don't have alot of wealth, there may be people who have even less. So we should give, even though we will likely not give as much as people who have alot. Also, we can give in other ways such as providing from our own food, or even providing help in some work.
It is almost if it is implied here that if you are a believer, then you should not consume interest. And if you do, then the consequence is that of the disbelievers! So the tone is that avoiding consumption of interest is part of eemaan.
I also recall reading the word adh'aaf before. So I did a quick search and found it has been mentioned a few times in reference to charity, which we are promised will be doubled and multiplied.
So in other words, Allaah does not like for us to seek the temporary financial benefit of usury, rather He would like us to seek the benefit of charity, which is blessed in duniya and aakhirah! That in itself (duniya plus aakhirah) is a profitable transaction. And the reward from Allaah for charity is more.
When do you call someone by a characteristic? When you want them to be reminded about it, for example?
If I say, oh generous person, please donate to this charity. Then I am reminding the person that they are generous, so they need to act accordingly.
So maybe we are being reminded that if we are believers, our actions have to manifest that belief, and whatever follows in the verse/s is one of the actions which is a manifestation of belief.
In other words, if we are believers, we should do this action or abstain from doing it depending on how the verse is worded (command or prohibition)
RSS feed for comments to this post