Part 11: Bukhl (Miserliness)- Heart Therapy

Read the Table of Contents of Heart Therapy

Read Part 10 (a): Fighting against one’s love of this World

Love of this world leads to miserliness.

Definition: Miserliness (Bukhl) is from the root word ba-kha-la which means ‘to be or become niggardly, tenacious, stingy, penurious, or avaricious; bukhl is niggardliness, tenaciousness, stinginess.

Miserliness is to

• refuse to give something that one has acquired to someone upon  request;
• it is worse when the one who requests it is entitled to that thing,
• and that which is even more worse than that is the person who is miserly with someone else’s property.

Proof:

Qur’an

“Those who are stingy and order the people to be stingy…” (4: 37)

Hadith

Jabir ibn Abd Allah said that the Messenger of Allah said, “Beware of suspicion, for suspicion is the worst of false tales; and do not look for the others’ faults and do not spy, and do not be jealous of one another, and do not desert (cut your relation with) one another, and do not hate one another; and O Allah’s worshipers! Be brothers (as Allah has ordered you!”) (Bukhari)

Types of Bukhl

Islam identifies two main aspects of miserliness. Firstly, that which is against the Shari’ah and, secondly, that which is contrary to meritorious character.

1. Bukhl against the Shariah: One can be a miser with respect to the Shari’ah if one witholds from paying zakat or from supporting one’s dependants, etc. In other words, if a person withholds from any obligatory type of spending in Islam, he is considered a miser according to the Shari’ah. This is haram and it is necessary for the person to cure himself of this disease.
2. Bukhl against meritorious character: Bukhl that goes against one’s having meritorious character, is that which lacks virtuous merit. A person afflicted with this type of bukhl would refuse to give in charity, even when knowing that the situation of the one begging is genuine and dire and yet he was fully capable of parting with a small sum. Such a person would typically harass those he has loaned money to, regardless of whether or not he himself needs the money back immediately.

Ali (RA) said that the rich miser is poorer than the generous poor person. This is because he is mentally poor. He has a psyche that he cannot give.

Note:

Bukhl is totally contrary to the Islamic practise of generosity. The Prophet (SAW) was extremely generous and, in Ramadan, he was described as being like a ‘whirlwind’. In other words, the narrator of the hadith, could not think of a word to descrive the tremendous generosity he displayed. In another narration, Jabir said the Prophet (SAW) was never asked for anything and said, “No”.

Read the next part 11 (a): Curing Miserliness