before Khalid in Kufa, with the city’s dignitaries around him, when a man stood up and said, “May Allah set the governor aright!”

Khalid halted—for he was a generous man—and asked, “What is the matter with you?”

The man said, “Will you order that my head be struck off?”

Khalid asked, “Why? Have you committed highway robbery?”

“No.”

“Have you rebelled against lawful authority?”

“No.”

“Then for what reason should I cut off your head?”

“Because of poverty and dire need.”

Khalid said, “State your wish.”

“Thirty thousand.”

Khalid turned to those with him and said, “Do you know of any merchant who has made the profit I made this morning? I had intended for him one hundred thousand, yet he only asked for thirty.”

He then ordered that the amount be given to the man.

It is also reported that Khalid would sit, have the sealed money-bags brought in, and say, “These riches are only trusts; they must be dispersed.”

It is related that a Bedouin recited to him:
O Khalid, between praise and recompense lies my plea;
Whichever of the two arrives, you are its pillar.
O Khalid, I have come to you for no request
Save that I am in want while you are generous.

Khalid said, “Ask.”

“One hundred thousand.”

“You have been excessive, Bedouin.”

“Shall I lessen it for the governor?”

“Yes.”

“I have lessened it for you by ninety thousand.”

Khalid was amazed and said, “I asked you according to your worth, and you reduced it according to mine—according to what I deem myself deserving of.”

The man replied, “No, by Allah, you shall not outdo me. Boy, give him one hundred thousand!”

Al-Asmaʿi relates that a Bedouin declaimed in the poets’ gathering:
You so plied me with bounty that you revived me,
And kept on giving until I thought you were jesting.
You are generosity—its son, its brother,
Its constant ally; generosity has no path away from you.

Khalid gave him one hundred thousand.

Al-Asmaʿi—on the authority of Yunus ibn Habib—reports a similar incident and adds: another Bedouin then rose and said:
Before his passing Adam long ago
Entrusted you while drawing his final breath in the wasteland