Ihyaaud Deen An Effort to Revive Deen in Totality
A Thousand Dirhams Goes Around Between Three Friends
Imaam Waaqidi (rahimahullah) has related the following incident:
I had two friends; a Haashimi and a non-Haashimi. We three were very close to each other and were like inseparable friends.
Once, I was going through some financial problems. When the day of eid was near, my wife said to me, “We can be patient in all conditions, but the day of eid is near, and I cannot bear to see my children weeping and crying like this. I feel as though my heart would break when I see them in old clothes, while other children in our neighbourhood are buying new clothes and other fine things for eid. My heart is filled with pity for them. If you could please get me some money from somewhere, I would sew new clothes for them.”
Hearing these words from my wife, I wrote a note to my Haashimi friend, telling him about my sad condition. He sent me a sealed bag containing one thousand dirhams, mentioning that I could use the money as I liked.
I had not even opened the bag when I received a note from my other friend (the non-Haashimi), informing me about his poverty and need (just like I had written to my Haashimi friend). On reading the note, I sent the sealed bag of dirhams to my non-Haashimi friend.
Feeling shy of going home to my wife without anything, I did not have the courage to return home. I therefore stayed in the musjid for two days, and on the third day, I went home and told my wife the truth about the money. Surprisingly, she did not complain at all, but rather praised my generosity and said that I had behaved excellently towards my friend.
As we sat talking to each other, my Haashimi friend came with the same sealed bag that he had sent me three days before and said, “Tell me the truth about this bag. How has it reached me again?” I explained to him how I had sent it to our non-Haashimi friend immediately after receiving it from him.
The Haashimi then said to me, “When I received your note, I had nothing in my possession except this bag, which I sent to you. Thereafter, I wrote to my non-Haashimi friend asking him for help, and I was surprised when he sent me my own sealed bag which I had sent to you. Wondering how it had reached him, I have come to you to solve this mystery.”
Imaam Waaqidi (rahimahullah) says:
We then gave one hundred dirhams from the money to my wife, and distributed the remaining nine hundred dirhams equally among ourselves.
Somehow, the Khalifah Maamoon Rasheed came to know of this incident and called me to his court. I told him the entire incident, and he gave us seven thousand dirhams as a reward – two thousand dirhams for each of us and one thousand dirhams for my wife.
(Fazaa’il-e-Sadaqaat [Urdu] pg. 706)
