Charity and its Nobility

Alhamdulillah I did manage to follow a lecture series at Masjid Jamek, Petaling Jaya, located just 10 minutes away from my house by walking. It has been a while since my last visit to 'Kuliah Maghrib' held at the mosque.

The topic that was delivered by the ustaz was ' Charity ' and its noble wisdom.

He first clarified that charity is divided into two categories: waajib (obligatory), which is called Zakat and sunnat (voluntary) which we call charity. He also mentioned there is difference between 'sadaqah' and 'sadaqatul jariah'. He gave examples of giving charity to a person to do hajj and giving charity (sponsoring) to a student majoring in Islamic studies. The former is normal 'sadaqah' while the latter is called 'sadaqatul jariah'. It implies that 'sadaqatul jariah' is the charity given which has chain effects of rewards. The charity giver will get the rewards first by sponsoring a student, later when the student teaches his/student, the charity giver will get his share as well. And later if the student of the former student has and teaches another student, the former charity giver will still be able to taste the rewards from his charity without diminishing the rewards of the first student. In simpler word, so long as the results of charity continues, the charity giver will still be blessed with rewards from Allah. What a beautiful deed to have!

Narrated from a hadeeth narrator that Prophet sallalahu`alayhiwasallam said " When we fork out money for charity (be it waajib or voluntary), the act will be saying to us these five things as below (remember only four and not in order )=) :

1. " Before the money goes out from your pocket, (RM1)..the value is small, but after the money goes into charity bowl, the value becomes much bigger"

2. " Previously, you took care of me (before giving out for charity reason), now after you set me into charity bowl , I`ll take care of you"

3. " Before you took me out from pocket, I was impermanent, just like other things; however after you move myself into charity bowl, I become permanent"

4. " Before you took me out from your pocket, I was once your enemy; after you did put me into charity bowl, I become your good friend"

Ustaz also mentioned that when we give charity, say to a poor person, actually what we are doing is that we are giving out his money, not ours. In every possessions that we have, there is a portion belongs to these poor people, as Allah has prescribed. Even though in reality, we are the owner of our possession; in the eyes of ALlah and the true reality, we are just the guardian of the items. Allah is the sole and ultimate landlord. We are just bestowed upon the ticket of guardian. Thus, giving the money to these people actually means giving his money back.