Ar-Razzāq - The One Who Provides All Sustenance
He is the One who created the means of sustenance and those who need it. The purpose of the former is to satisfy the latter. (Ar-Razzāq) also created for them the causes of enjoying this sustenance. (Actually) there are two kinds of sustenance. One is manifest sustenance, and it consists of nourishment and food. These exist for that which is manifest, namely, the physical bodies. The other is hidden (sustenance) consisting of various types of knowledge and disclosures. These exist for (human) hearts and inner beings. The latter is the more noble of the two kinds of sustenance, for the fruit of it is eternal life. The fruit of the manifest sustenance is strength for the human body for a limited period of time. God (Himself) is the One who has assumed the responsibility for the creation of both types of sustenance, and He graciously makes them available to both categories, (that is to say, human bodies and hearts). But He grants them (amply) to whom He will and He measures (it to another).
The utmost that man can hope to achieve of this characterization are (the following) two (possibilities). That he recognizes the real nature of this characterization, and that no one (really) deserves it except God Most High; and does not expect the sustenance except from Him and relies only upon Him in respect of it. The second is that God should bestow upon him rightly guided knowledge, a tongue which offers rightly guided instruction and a hand replete with generous gifts so that he becomes a reason whereby his nourishment reaches the hearts of men through his words and deeds. The prophet said – may peace be upon him – “Certainly the faithful treasurer who carries out – one may possibly say ‘who gives’ – that which he is ordered to do, gives all that is expected of him, does this plentifully and in good spirits, and who gives it to the man to whom he is ordered to give it, (he also) is one of those who gives alms”.
The hands of man are God’s treasuries. The one whose hand is made a treasury of the sustenance for human bodies and whose tongue becomes a treasury of the sustenance of (human) hearts – (Oh!) how distinguished will be the rewards of one characterized in this manner!
